Thinking about creation

Faith, prayer and creation

2012-01-13T12:56:00.000-08:00

If people ask me why I believe in a Creator I point to the wonders of the living forms that populate this planet.

Quotes and comments;

1. 'Lord, You have created the heights of the mountains and the depths of the seas. Where You have commanded creatures to live, there they live to Your glory.' [1.]

- The fact seals and other marine creatures can live in the harsh conditions of the Antarctica gives glory to the Creator by showing us His great wisdom, creativity and imagination. The capabilities of animals give glory to their creator. As vast as the oceans are, the wisdom of God is many times more deep and more vast. Even the deepest ocean has a bottom, but the wisdom of God has no bottom, has no limit.

In the living (moving, breathing) creatures of the earth we see an expression of God's power, and of his ability to do all that he has promised in his Word.

The living creatures on this planet are an unceasing hymn of praise to the wisdom of our Creator.

Notes;
1. The Greatest Deep-Sea Divers - Paul Bartz
2. 'Even though it's a mammal and not a fish, the Weddell seal of the Antarctic is one of the greatest deep-sea divers in the world. Weighing up to 1,200 pounds, the Weddell seal can cruise under water for up to 70 minutes. It is able to reach depths as great as 1,600 feet.' [above]

The seperation of science and religion

2012-01-10T10:52:00.000-08:00

On the pressing need to rename the planets.

- Atheists often complain (it's their forte) of religionists getting involved in science. They scold all concerned that such interference ought not to be, and I don't know how any real writer (or real philosopher, or real human being for that matter) can disagree. We need to rid science of all vestiges of religion, and I think a good place to start is with the planets.

When you look at the planets (thru a telescope or in a book) you see the heavy hand of religion has been instrumental in naming them. The outrage here (and I think all real commentators feel it) is that they've all been named after various gods. This ought not to be. Can any rational person deny that they ought to be renamed. Just go through the list and see if you don't feel a rising anger in you.

The infamy of the situation;
We have Mercury (the winged god) Venus (the god of love) Mars (the god of war) Jupiter (the god of the sky) Saturn (the god of agriculture) Neptune (god of the sea) and so on. What real scientist can fail to be incensed at such a list.

What can we do? I suggest we rename the planets. My suggestion (and I think it's a good one) is to rename them after cartoon characters from Walt Disney films. My preliminary list goes as following; starting nearest the sun and heading out. (I leave it to others more worthy than myself to decide whether or not we need to rename the sun, as I believe star is another word for a god. We might in fact rename the sun Walt.) So we could start with renaming Mercury as Donald, Venus as Daffy, Mars as Goofy, Jupiter as Daisy, and so on.

I'm sure there's going to be a fierce debate over whether or not we need to rename Pluto as I think some people mistakenly believe it already is named after a Disney character. My research (I spent at least 10 seconds on Wikipedia) tells me this is not the case and it actually refers to one of the important gods of religion. [1.]

Certainly I have no desire to force my suggestions on the greater community (though I think they're going to be hard to beat). What I think we need is an international conference of all the leading scientists (the real kind) and have them decide by vote on this very important subject.

Addendum;
After writing this post someone suggested to me (no, it wasn't Walt) that perhaps we could use this great renaming event as a way of getting children and teenagers interested in science; and a way to do that would be to hand the naming process over to them. In this scenario they would vote on the Disney characters they wanted planets named after. Since I don't have a degree in the philosophy of childhood education I don't feel able to comment on this suggestion and leave it to my more qualified colleagues to decide.

- Mike Johnson [frfarer@gmail.com]

Notes;
1. The name Pluto was proposed by Venetia Burney (1918–2009), an eleven-year-old schoolgirl in Oxford, England. Venetia was interested in classical mythology as well as astronomy, and considered the name, a name for the god of the underworld, appropriate for such a presumably dark and cold world. - Wikipedia

Naturalism and Creation; a review of 'The Wedge of Truth' by Philip Johnson

2011-12-20T14:58:00.000-08:00

The Origins debate isn't really about creation or evolution so much as it's about theism vs materialism. One person who realizes this better than most is Philip Johnson. I want to comment on a few passages from his book.

Quotes and comments;

1. Speaking of Naturalism Johnson writes, "Under any of those names this philosophy assumes that in the beginning were the fundamental particles that compose matter, energy and the impersonal laws of physics. To put it negatively, there was no personal God who created the cosmos and governs it as an act of free will. It God exists at all, he acts only through inviolable laws of nature and adds nothing to them. In consequences, all the creating had to be done by the laws and the particles, which is to say by some combination of random chance and lawlike regularity." [1.]

- In his book he asks the reader to learn to ask good questions; so let's try a few. We need to ask what particles and physical laws can or do create. Can particles acting in terms of physical law actually create anything, or anything complex? We need to ask what we mean by create.

Create;
- late 14c., from L. creatus, pp. of creare "to make, bring forth, produce, beget," related to crescere "arise, grow"

- Can particles really 'bring forth' anything other than particles? I see no reason to believe they can beget life. (Create seems originally have been a word closely or even solely connected with birth. e.g. to create an infant)

1. 'To produce through artistic or imaginative effort
- I see no reason to believe particles are capable of artistic or imaginative effort. (Although a look at some modern art makes one wonder of human beings are capable of artistic effort :=}

2. 'To bring into being; cause to exist; specifically, to produce without the prior existence of the material used, or of other things like the thing produced; produce out of nothing.

3. 'To make or produce from crude or scattered materials; bring into form; embody: as, Peter the Great created the city of St. Petersburg; Palladio created a new style of architecture.
- To create a city is a banal accomplishment compared to the creation of a cell. E.s like to talk about some imagined 'primitive' cell; but it's our cities that are more legitimately called primitive, not cells. (If I look at a cell I don't see any neon advertising for 24 hr. a day sex shops, gambling casinos or hamburger joints.)

I see no evidence undirected chemical reactions can produce anything genuinely new; or to keep on producing genuinely new products. Chemicals beget chemicals not machines; physical laws cause cars to rust not to be manufactured.
(Compared to the riches of the biosphere, the 'begats' of chemistry produce a boring book indeed.)

4. 'To design, invest with a new form, shape, &c.
- Inert matter is unable to transcend itself; it takes intelligence and imagination to transcend the material realm, and it takes intentionality and purpose to want to do this. (A rock has no more desire to transcend or transform itself than a dictator does; rocks are the greatest couch potatoes on the planet... unlike teenagers they don't even dream of doing anything or of changing; they have less passion than the elderly on their death beds.)

The big problem for the materialist, as he tries to persuade people of his philosophy, is the task of explaining the genuinely new entity in the world. A cell is a million times more complex than a computer, but no one would even pretend to explain a computer without a reference to intelligence. He has an unsolvable puzzle on his hands, and it's one he's created for himself.

The main engine of progressive e. given in our textbooks has, for a long time, been mutations. This creates big problems for the e. theorist as mutations are negative in their actions. The question then is, 'how can mistakes create something new and of value?' To illustrate the conundrum I offer the following analogy;

Imagine we have a statue, and imagine we've grown tired of it and want a new one. We're cheap or we have no money so we say to a sculptor, turn this old block of stone (the statue) into a new one. If the sculptor agrees, the new statue he produces will of necessity be smaller than the old one. Each time we engage in this procedure the statue will be smaller. In the end we will end up with a grain of sand.

A few creationists have recently begun saying that mutations can indeed create new information. If this is so (and it might be) it's only because this possibility was designed into the genetic blueprint. i.e. if cosmic evolution were true, it wouldn't be possible for mutations to add anything new. It's only because organisms were created that such a possibility even exists. I see no way this could have happened by accident.

5. Creature;
- late 13c., "anything created," also "living being," from O.Fr. creature (Mod.Fr. créature), from L.L. creatura "thing created," from creatus, pp. of L. creare "create" (see create). Meaning "anything that ministers to man's comforts" (1610s), after I Tim. iv 4
- Create originally referred to either living organisms or to things made by living organisms; especially man himself.

The word create originally referred mainly to procreation. Since particles can't reproduce they can't procreate. If all you have are particles you have a dead world, an eternally dead world.

6. Creator;
- c.1300, "Supreme Being," from Anglo-Fr. creatour, O.Fr. creator (12c., academic and liturgical, alongside popular creere, Mod.Fr. créateur), from L. creator "creator, author, founder," from creatus (see create). Translated in O.E. as scieppend (from verb scieppan; see shape). Not generally capitalized until KJV. General meaning "one who creates" is from 1570s.

- It's my view that create originates in testimony of a creator God. ("In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth,'' may have been the first words ever spoken (by an angel) to Adam; the first words he ever heard.) I find that giving to particles the divine power of creation is the most absurd notion man has ever spoken. Chemical evolution denies the necessity of intelligence, imagination and personhood. (A strange view to be championed by intelligent, imaginative, persons.)

I find the idea of a mindless, accidental creation both impossible and nauseating. I reject it with the disdain I would treat a mud pie. I find it loathsome that human beings will not honor their creator, or at the very least acknowledge his work. To deny the Creator is akin to claiming a troop of monkeys wrote the plays of Shakespeare.

Chemical evolution is a counterfeit creation story. It's so preposterous it's akin to claiming Arthur's sword was a natural product, a mere product of rock formation, as natural as the rock it was embedded in.

Chemical evolution requires that particles possess God's wisdom; that they possess the information needed to create all the original living forms. As far as I know we don't have microscopes powerful enough to detect this, but as Darwinists like to say, I'm sure it's only a matter of time until we do. (Skeptics will want to know where particles got this information content, but it's clear that it was produced with the big bang, when normal physical laws didn't exist and so this was possible. It's true that we don't yet know how this happened, but there's a general feeling among scientists that in a matter of 5-10 years we'll know.)

2. ‘Science’, in the strong sense, deals with repeatable events under precisely controlled conditions, and these testable results are to be valid across time, location and experimenter. Although all conclusions should still be treated as tentative descriptive models, even incomplete understanding can lead to advances in technology and medicine. Christians certainly approve of this form of knowledge acquisition, when applied in beneficial ways not contrary to God’s commandments. However, scientific methodologies available to interpret historical and geological events are, unfortunately, far less reliable. [2.]

- The game people like Sam Harris etc. play is to conflate real (hard) science with such philosophical speculations as neo-Darwinism. Darwinism is to science what plastic fruit is to a full course meal. It's little more than comical to say creationists are against science. This is like saying one is against food because one doesn't like Haggis. (Darwinism is to science what a carriage drawn to the moon by encapsulated dew drops is to a space ship. It's an imaginative story yes; but it won't get you anywhere.)

This is a far more important question than many realize. It's not just a philosophical 'game' as it were. Take a mouse; do its 'thoughts' reflect an external reality? How well do they reflect reality? how much of reality do they reflect? We can ask similar questions of human beings.

Is there any way for us to know if our thoughts reflect an external reality? Is there a way to know how well they do this? It's absurd to speak of facts if we can't answer these questions.

How well do the 'thoughts' (let's be liberal) of a goldfish reflect the reality of the ocean? Should we rely on it for information about the seas? Would it be a good guide for navigation? We might imagine that it thinks it knows all there is to know about water. It might even consider itself an
expert.

3. ‘By information I mean a message that conveys meaning, such as a book of instructions.’ [3.]

- We find no information in particles, but perhaps this is only because we haven't looked hard enough. We see no guidelines on how to construct a biological organism. (Perhaps someone forgot to write the manual, or forgot to enclose it.) We can say that particles were created by an intelligent agent, but they're not intelligent in and of themselves. They don't need intelligence and (thus?) don't have it. They're the blind leading the blind

Particles don't require these functions and so don't have them. It's important to stress that in the story of cosmic evolution these mechanisms at one time didn't exist. (For me this is all the data I need to reject Materialism.) The claim of chemical evolution is as believable to me as the claim one could safely drive across the country in a car without brakes or a steering wheel.

People who deny creation are like those who deny their own faces in a mirror. One hardly finds their protestations believable.

4. "When a mutation makes a bacterium resistant to antibiotics, for example, it does so by disabling its capacity to metabolize a certain chemical. There is a net loss of information and of fitness in a general sense, but there is a gain in fitness in specific toxin-filled environments.'' [4.]

- Human beings themselves provide far better evidence for a source of creation than do bacteria. Why do men look into bacteria when they should be looking into their own hearts? Is there something they're trying to escape?

Human society in our day (as I suppose it is in every day) is an especially toxin filled environment... and some people do indeed do well in it. e.g. Darwinists. We might think of Humanism as a loss of information.

5. ‘One convenient way of expressing this distinction is to say that the standard examples of micro-evolution are all of horizontal evolution, while the grand creative process should be called vertical evolution." [5.]

- The materialist is of all people the one with the least amount of hope for his position; he's literally climbing the walls in search of an answer. Chemical evolution is a riddle invented by the few to torture the many. A far more rational approach is agnosticism.

6. "Whereas the drafting committee had defined science as the human activity of seeking natural explanations, the board substituted that "science is the human activity of seeking logical explanations for what we observe in the world around us." [6.]

- The idea 'science' is about seeking natural' explanations is founded on the pretense that there's only one kind of explanation; that there's only way level of explanation. We need to stress that there are many ways of defining terms (especially important terms). This can be seen by a brief look at any dictionary. The attempt to define science in a single sentence (or entry) is a comical enterprise at best.

Modernists (especially of the atheist sort) have attempted to define science in a way it never was in the past. They've tried to narrow the definition until it becomes equal to materialism and reductionism. i.e. they've applied reductionism to the idea of science as they apply it to everything else. They want to make science a guild or closed shop; where only card carrying atheists may apply. (It's perhaps unnecessary to point out how undemocratic this agenda is.)

Science;
1. In a general sense, knowledge, or certain knowledge; the comprehension or understanding of truth or facts by the mind.
Webster 1828
2. Accumulated and established knowledge, which has been systematized and formulated with reference to the discovery of general truths or the operation of general laws; knowledge classified and made available in work, life, or the search for truth; comprehensive, profound, or philosophical knowledge. - W/1913

7. Johnson says that students should have the right to judge the merits of Neo-Darwinism;
‘Is the "evolution" that biologists observe merely a matter of variation within preexisting species or types, or is it a genuine creative process that over time can produce new complex organs and new kinds of organism?’ [7.] (p. 72).

* - I find it odd that students are encouraged to decide for themselves what is morally right and wrong, to decide whether or not to have sex or even an abortion, but they're not allowed to decide whether or not Darwinism can fully account for the life forms on the planet. This is akin to telling a small child what shoes he must wear but letting himself decide whether or not to cross the hiway. Again we see an anti-democratic spirit at work in the schools when it comes to the creation/evolution debate.

8. ‘For example, Scientific American editor-in-chief John Rennie urged scientists on university admissions committees to notify the Kansas governor and the state board of education that "in light of the newly lowered education standards in Kansas, the qualifications of any students applying from that state in the future will have to be considered very carefully"’ (p. 80).

- The worst bullies in the educational system are not students, but teachers, professors and outside agitators like Rennie. This is a vile and utterly uncivil threat levelled at students and their parents.

Why would anyone think Rennie is going to be honest about the Origins debate?

8. "Gould takes for granted that all such questions are within the magisterium of science." [8.]’ (p. 98).

- I find comical the idea science (i.e. scientists) will define what is and isn't religion. This is like a thief defining property rights, or a child telling his parents what his rights are and what their duties are.

9. "For example, Richard Dawkins commented that science is compatible with religion if the latter means only feelings of awe at the wonders of the universe or the fundamental laws of physics." [9.]

- I have to admit I rarely find myself in awe over the fundamental laws of physics; no doubt this is a personal failing. The atheist wants to restrict religion to feeling; but wouldn't that make his own feelings religious? What then of his feeling that there is no God; wouldn't that qualify as a religious feeling?

10. "They [the Darwinists] realise that it is safer to allow God a shadowy existence in human subjectivity than to run the risk that this very threatening presence will burst into objective reality. That is when we hear the standard vague reassurances that "many people believe in both God and evolution", or that "science does not say that God does not exist", or that "science and religion are separate realms."’ [10.]

- It's my view that science and religion are as separate as body and soul. I believe that as man is a single unit so is truth; as man has various aspects so has investigation into human experience. As man is in the universe, so is science within Revelation (or creation).

Realm;
1. A community or territory over which a sovereign rules; a kingdom.
- Ideally the sciences are provinces within the kingdom of God. In general terms we can say that 'science' and 'religion' are provinces within the same kingdom. To see a conflict between science and religion is taking an atomistic approach when a holistic approach is what's called for.

If Materialism is consistently applied it leads to the death of man, and how strange it is that men should construct philosophies that lead to their own extinction. What happened to the will to survive? Did it begin to die off with the advent of Darwinism? Maybe people on the whole aren't all that thrilled with being apes (in drag). That some few are is certainly true; but then again we do have some funny parades now days don't we? I wouldn't take seriously anything purple people eaters have to say about Origins.

Extremophile enthusiasm for Darwinism is something I don't understand; even though I accepted Evolution (M2M) when I was a teenager and maintained it all through my twenties. Why some people are so fanatic about it is beyond me, as it seems a horrid nightmare of an idea.

If there were no self how could there be facts? Aren't facts conclusions made by persons? ie. by selves. If there is no self who (what?) is it that believes x to be true? Do particles believe things? Don't you have to think to believe?

If we reduce everything down to the particle level how do we answer the question of reality; what then becomes of reality? What then is it? Is there any reality at the particle level? I can't imagine there is, but it would be a funny kind of reality if there were. If we reduce everything to the particle level we lose rationality, and words are only noise and thoughts only chemical reactions. To take everything to the particle level is to live beneath our station, it's to live without any awareness of who we are.

If we take things down (way, way down) to the particle level who is there to say what is reality. Reality is, after all, a pronouncement made by a person. If there are no selves there is therefore no reality. (The Biblical creationist of course believes that it is the Creator who makes the pronouncement of what reality is.)

If there are no selves who is going to compose the agreement (consensus) needed to create the facts of reality? If there is no self there is no reality and if there is no reality there are no facts. This unfortunately means for the materialist that nothing he says can be true.

11. "The irony is that eliminative materialism itself is fatal to science, since it implies that even the scientists are not really conscious and that their boasted rationality is really rationalization." [11.]

- The atheist claims he doesn't need a metaphysical basis for his opinions, but this is like a man saying he has no need of a place to stand, or a fish saying it has no need of water, or a bird saying it has no need of sky. It's true that the atheist is able to speak about morality and ethics (etc.) but his words have no necessary connection to reality. e.g. you might succeed in selling a gullible person a non-existent island, but the sale doesn't make the island appear.
The materialist is in the position of trying to live on a non-existent island. (The only way he can survive is to catch a ride from a creationist with a boat.)

Ideas not rooted in reality will necessarily disappear. The rejection of intelligent creation is an idea that cannot and will not stand the test of time. Materialism is a non-existent island floating in the void.

- Mike Johnson [frfarer at Gmail.com]

Notes;
1. The Wedge of Truth: Splitting the Foundations of Naturalism by Phillip E. Johnson; 2000 p.13
2. p. 37
3. p. 42
4. p.46
5. p.128
6. p.68
7. p.72
8. p.98
9. p.100
10. p.141
11. p.119
12. Note; Would it be correct to say that what the Materialist calls emergence the creationist calls transcendence?
Transcend;
1. To exist above and independent of (material experience or the universe):
- The Materialist claims that intelligence is an emergent quality, while the creationist claims it's a transcendent entity. i.e. it's independent of matter because it's not the produce of matter but of information (that is embedded in matter). I think that what we call 'life' is also a transcendent entity; that all life forms are not merely 'emergent' phenomenon but transcendent realities.
13. I need to note that I borrowed these quotations from a review by Royal Truman. I read the book some years ago but didn't make any notes. Since he's a writer I respect I read the review even though I'd read the book.

Materialism and the mindless game

2011-12-16T13:44:00.000-08:00

Today I want to make a few comments about the book 'The way of the Cell' by Franklin M. Harold [2001]
Quotes and comments;

1. ‘The bedrock premise of this book is that life is a material phenomenon, grounded in chemistry and physics … The findings of biologists … compel us to admit that we humans, like all other organisms, are transient constellations of jostling molecules, brought forth by a mindless game of chance devoid of plan or intent’. [1.]

- The data in no way compel people to think anything; they can't... they're impersonal and mute.
The fact chemistry and physics are involved in biological organisms in no way necessitates that this is All that is involved.

I'm sure professor Harold knows a lot, and a lot more than I do, but I fail to see how he can know that life is a 'mindless game of chance' without having access to a more than earthly (sized) library. Has he managed to communicate with Micromegas I wonder :=}

The trouble for the materialist is that if the universe is a mindless game of chance we couldn't possibly know it. This claim has nothing to do with empirical science, and we ask the professor to admit it. He claims that there is no plan or intent to anything in the universe, but isn't he a bit afraid he's only expressing his ignorance? All he can properly say is that he doesn't see any... or admit that he doesn't want to see any. If he's what he says he is (or is he only talking about us non-tenured folk) then how can he expect mere matter in motion, a product of a mindless game of chance to know the deepest reality (realities) of the universe?

What's so ironic about his proclamation is that he knows full well that we see more than chemistry and physics in the cell. (Matter and physics give you chemistry, they don't give you a living cell, they don't give you information, they don't give you code, they don't give you machines.) Professor Harold is asking far more from these humble servants than they can possibly deliver.

2. 'Consistent with the theme of ‘biological organization’ (p. xi), the avowed purpose of the book ‘is to assess how far we have come toward a scientific understanding of the phenomenon
of life’ (p. ix).

- The scientific understanding? as opposed to the understanding? I'm intrigued by why he adds the adjective. Understanding is understanding is it not? I suspect that by scientific understanding he means materialist understanding. i.e. an understanding of 'life' in terms solely of materialism. We need to ask then if that would constitute understanding. If creation is true then it does not, as at best the materialist could only have a partial understanding. If the goal of research is a complete understanding why would a scientist insist on a purely materialist model. Is he interested in understanding or in materialism?

3. ‘...living things differ from nonliving nonliving ones most pointedly in their capacity to maintain, reproduce and multiply states of matter characterized by an extreme degree of organization’ (p. xi).

- Is this the biggest differentiation between living and non-living things? Is the difference between inert matter and living organism one solely of the degree of organization? I suppose that's one way you could look at it, but it's not one I find intellectually fulfilling. There is far more than organization going on here. You could organize a bunch of sand grains in an incredibly complex way and never get them to fly away or reproduce. As a physicalist he's too focused on the material to see what an inadequate explanation this is.

4. 'Natural selection emerges as the preeminent creative force to which we owe all the marvels of biology’ (p. 192).

- If natural selection were the creative force behind the biosphere we wouldn't owe it a thing as it's not a person. (It's not even a mechanism for that matter.) Calling natural selection a creative force is like calling the wind or the rain a creative force; we might as well worship the sun and the moon.

Calling natural selection a creative force is like calling a pencil sharpener the creative force behind a poem or essay. Harold apparently conflates an effective force and a creative force; but this is a difference as large as that between a chisel and a sculptor, a fire and a blacksmith.

If everything is merely matter in motion and the unintended product of a mindless game of chance why do we (humans) look at the world and experience awe? If all is chemistry and physics where is this awe coming from, and why do we experience living forms as marvels? How is it matter is in awe of matter?

Harold might have been better off studying the word marvel than reading the lastest diatribe by Dawkins, and would have learned more.
Marvel;
1. Strong surprise; astonishment.
- Why should matter be surprised and astonished at matter?
2. One that evokes surprise, admiration, or wonder
3. To wonder at; be struck with surprise at; be perplexed with curiosity about:
- If we could tune in on them would we here grains of sand singing hymns of praise to rocks :=} Is it right for Harold to marvel, but the problem is that he doesn't let his wonder instruct him; he acknowledges it briefly and then moves on, when he should sit and ponder the lesson to be learned. i.e. ''how is it a bag of chemicals is filled with wonder?'' or ''what are the implications of this astonishment and awe?" Rather than listen to this still small voice he escapes into theory, saving himself from discomfiting thoughts.

Marvel;
- c.1300, "miracle," also "wonderful story or legend," from O.Fr. merveille "a wonder," from V.L. *miribilia, alt. from L. mirabilia "wonderful things," from neut. pl. of mirabilis "strange or wonderful," from mirari "to wonder at," from mirus "wonderful" (see smile).

- To call something a marvel is to call it a miracle. The theologian C. Van Til was adamant that all men know God, and when we hear an atheist like Harold call the living organism a marvel it's my view that he's admitting his awareness of the creator. (At some level he knows there is a creator. This sounds confusing but we're all aware that people can know something but be unwilling to admit it. e.g. the pro athlete who won't admit he's not good enough, the would-be writer, the man who needs help but won't admit it, and so on.)

I'm sure he wouldn't agree, but his language gives him away. (Maybe we can say that his language center knows there's a Creator :=} I don't think the use of words is entirely arbitrary; in fact I think it's close to the opposite. (We might say that prof. Harold is looking at the marvels of the world and smiling, but that he doesn't know why.) I'll believe in materialism when I see a rock smile and wink its eye.

5. ‘...no cosmic plan, only molecules whose writhings and couplings underlie and explain all that the cell does’ (p. 65).

- To say that molecules explain all that the cell does (and I think this even incorrect on a banal level) is akin to saying the wheels and springs inside a watch explain all there is about it. It's akin to calling the ocean a nice reflective surface that does a good job of reproducing clouds.

I suppose I'm jealous of his expertise and learning, but how is it he knows there is no cosmic plan? I wonder if I could get him to share with me his methodology. This is akin to enjoying a tasty bowl of soup and looking for the cook inside the empty soup tin.

6. 'In Chapter 8 Harold tries to unravel the early history of life and regrets ‘that more than three quarters of that history does not lend itself to public display, for it is wholly the record of microbial life’ (p. 159).

- Life isn't a matter of numbers or statistics. Like the angry Earthman in Voltaire's Micromega, I refuse to accept the quantitative analysis of life on earth as authoritative, as telling us anything about meaning or importance.

Why the regret Prof. Harold? Ask yourself how it is that a bit of matter, a transient constellation of molecules, feels regret. (We know why Jesus wept, but why do you?) If all is matter in motion then nothing can be other than what it is, nothing could have been other than what it was. There is no reason for regret in materialism. Chemicals know nothing of regret, they don't long for things that don't exist, they feel no loss or sorrow. (Am I missing something? Perhaps I've not looked into a microscope long enough.

Prof. H. regrets that he can't share what he knows with his audience, but chemicals have no desire to share anything; so how is it he has this feeling? Aren't the bigger marvels his feelings of awe, wonder and regret?

Can there really be a history of microbial life? Can we have history without persons? No one ever witnessed the events you write about, and therefore can't give us a history of it. You can't separate history from intelligent, personal agents.

7. 'After expressing his concerns about tree problems he still has the ‘courage’ to say,
‘The great tree is likely to be seen as one of the triumphs of biology in the twentieth century’ (p. 162).

- How is it a product of mindless chance, chemistry plus time can know what the verdict of future generations will be upon a Darwinian construct? If all is matter in motion how can anything be a triumph? Does matter triumph over matter?

How is it courage exists in a mindless universe of matter in motion? Don't these stirrings of courage tell us the materialist vision is false? Does one rock admire another rock's willingness to fall? (Has anyone heard such a story? If the rocks could speak is this what they would say?) When I see rocks marching as soldiers in line behind some great bolder, or when I see them cheering such a parade, is when I'll believe in Materialism.

To rejoice, to know what it is to feel this elation in triumph is to experience the fallacy of materialism in one's own bosom. To see the fallacy of m. all one has to do is meditate upon one's feeling of joy. (no bit of matter has ever experienced it.) The simplest hymn the homeliest congregation has ever sung refutes materialism.

I hate to be pedantic, but the phrase twentieth century can't have any meaning in terms of a consistent materialism. It's akin to dating the genealogy of mice or ducks by the first opening of Disneyland. (I hate to be called pedantic at any rate.)

8. 'In spite of the fact that the ‘tree’ is badly tangled at the present time, and we understand less than we thought we knew in the past few decades, Harold and others maintain their ‘faith’ in a
phylogenetic tree.

- The phylogenetic tree is so tangled it looks like a ball of fishing twine on the bottom of the skiff after a rough day out in the bay. With each passing year, and each passing rock of the boat it gets more and more tangled. Trying to make sense of it is akin to reading the future from animal entrails.

9. ‘The postulate of a single universal ancestor, its biblical overtones notwithstanding, rests on a solid foundation of fact’ (p. 169).

- We can only surmise from this that prof. Harold has a very liberal definition of fact. (Was he the one who defined evolution as change?) To claim a factual foundation for chemical evolution is akin to saying there's a factual foundation for Vulcans.

10. ‘The most compelling argument [for common ancestry] comes from the discovery that all extant organisms employ the same genetic code’ (p. 169).

- I don't know how an ecosystem could work any other way, but then again I know so little when compared to prof. Harold. Could we imagine a global ecosystem that didn't have a single code?
If you were designing a planet professor Harold, would you or would you not base it on a single genetic code? [3.]

11. '‘No satisfying scheme of this kind is presently on the books, and I have none to offer … The origin of life appears to me as incomprehensible as ever, a matter for wonder but not for explication’ (p. 251).

- On p.169 he told us chemical evolution has a solid basis in fact, but now he seems to have changed his mind :=} It's a fact, but it's incomprehensible? Apparently.

He's not satisfied by his inability to explain chemical e. to be able to show us how it could be true; but why if he's merely a bag of chemicals why is he dissatisfied? In his feelings of frustration, and dissatisfaction he has all the evidence he needs for realizing m. isn't (and can't) be true. A desire for rational comprehension can't be explained by chemicals plus physics. If the professor would pay more attention to his own experience and less to textbooks he might find his way out of the tangled maze of theory he's stuck in.

Do rocks care about being intellectually satisfied? Man's longing for understanding is all the evidence he needs that Materialism is false.

12. 'Harold recognizes that these types of study constitute ‘historical’ science where the tools are ‘soft’; ‘hard science is stymied … the trail is too cold, the traces too faint’ (p. 252).

- Well; let's stop pretending Evolution is a fact in that case. The only fact in this scenario is that there are no facts.

13. ‘We should reject, as a matter of principle, the substitution of intelligent design for the dialogue of chance and necessity’ (p. 205).

- The dialogue of chance and necessity? Is that anything like the dialogue of nose and finger?
As a matter of principle? what principle? what principle does matter adhere to? what principle do chemicals hold near and dear? If all were matter in motion the idea of principles would be a delusion.

14. Harold also concedes that, ‘a chance origin [of life] commands much less respect than it did a decade or two ago, for two reasons.’ The first is the enormous improbability (not enough time and atoms for all the necessary trials). The second reason is that ‘science cannot really deal with unique events, which are effectively miraculous’ (p. 239).

- As Cornelius Van Til said; all men know God.
If all were simply chemicals plus physics it' hard for me to understand how there could be unique events; but I suppose this is only my naivete at work, fooling me into believing there's a need for a creator. I'm sure prof. Harold knows better. As far as I know, there are no unique events in chemistry, and there are no unique events in terms of physics. Whence then comes the unique event?

15. 'The general scientific consensus that there was a naturalistic origin of life about four
billion years ago is accepted because, first, there is no ‘palatable alternative...’

- If people don't find creation a 'palatable' alternative I would think it's because their taste buds are out of whack.
All he's saying is, 'creation can't be true, because I don't like it.' Why the 'thoughts' of a bag of chemicals should be determinative as to the constitution of the universe is something the atheist doesn't tell us. - Life is full of things we don't like, and I suspect the ultimate nature of reality is just one more.

16. ‘...absent the presumption of a terrestrial and natural genesis there would be no basis for scientific inquiry into the origin of life’ (p. 237).

- Is there such a thing as a 'scientific' inquiry into the origin of life. Harold tells us elsewhere that he doesn't think there is! Did he forget that he also told us, ‘science cannot really deal with unique events, which are effectively miraculous’ [239.]

- M. Johnson

Notes;
1. The Way of the Cell: Molecules, Organisms and the Order of Life by Franklin M. Harold; 2001 review by Wayne Frair (pp. 254–255)
- my comments are based on a review of the book. (I missed the book when it came out.)
2. We might call Darwinism 'The way of the Sell'
3. You should be thankful there's only one genetic code professor; since you can't explain where the one we have came from imagine how embarassing it would be not to be able to explain several.
4. '...Harold’s summary of how he conceives that, strictly by chance (naturalistic) processes, life could have begun: presence of diverse localized and abundant organic molecules; compartmentation; stream of energy; mounting levels of complexity; energy flux to organization; transmissible, executable, alterable and repeatedly-tested genetic code (pp. 250–251)
- Didn't he tell us everything was a matter of chemistry and physics? I see a whole lot here that isn't chemicals or physics!
Let's not forget that it all has to work together, and all has to come together at the right time.
What does complexity have to do with chemicals? Is there a chemical called complexity? Is there a chemical called compartmentation?
5. ‘… but we must concede that there are presently no detailed Darwinian accounts of the evolution of any biochemical or cellular system, only a variety of wishful speculations’ (p. 205).
- Does he know himself better than we suspect, or was he merely having an off day?
Detailed accounts? there are no accounts period.

Afraid to fly

2011-12-02T09:16:00.000-08:00

One of the major planks in the idea of cosmic evolution is the transformation of reptiles into birds. I find this notion highly improbable.

Quote and comments;

1. 'Many textbooks tell young people today that birds are modified reptiles. Suppose, they say, that millions of years ago the scales on some reptiles began to fray along the edges. In time, they say, the frayed scales turned into feathers and birds were born. [1.]

- Why would scales begin to fray?
What would cause this? (Scales are pretty tough things, and appear to be designed not to fray.) As far as I know, we don't see that happening in our day. Furthermore, it would appear that there are 'mechanisms' in place to see to it that scales don't fray.
If a scale is damaged this isn't duplicated in offspring. What would make a 'fraying' that was reproduced? Presumbably some mutation; but I've never heard of this particular mutation.

Isn't it likely that if this scenario were to happen that the reptiles with fraying scales would be less able to compete and thus die out? Does it help a human being to get skin disease? Does it help them if their skin starts to decay and fall off? Is a sweater getting better or worse when it starts to unravel? Does a shirt turn into a pair of pants by wearing out?

Would it help humans to lose finger nails I wonder.

A 'frayed' scale turns into a bird? Really? That doesn't sound like science to me. In reality frayed scales get dropped and is replaced by a normal (unfrayed) scale.
People seem to forget that a scale has a job to do; a frayed scale is thus reduced in its capacity to do its job. (A rope that begins to fray can resist less and less stress until it breaks; and here we see evolutionary theory hanging by a thread.)

A reptile with damaged scales would presumably be less able to move, less able to ward off attack, less able to retain moisture, and perhaps less able to camouflage themselves, and perhaps more. It's hard to imagine how this could be beneficial. [2.]

When these frayed scales turned into feathers I wonder which way they turned, because it was a hell of a trick. This is like a rag turning into a fur coat, or a toy wagon turning into a Cadillac. This is one of the secular miracles that Darwinism relies on. Everyone knows this is nothing but a story; spreading paper over a pothole.

2. 'Even the most clever rebuilding of a reptile cannot produce a bird. In fact, birds have very little in common with reptiles. [5.]

- The idea reptiles were transformed into birds has its source in a particular (Uniformitarian) interpretation of the fossil record. No one would dream of such an 'impossible' transfiguration without the fossil record; without a particular reading of the fossil record. (The fossil record we see in textbooks is a deliberate construct, and not a faithful representation of the real world.)

Summary;
"Doth the hawk fly by thy wisdom, [and] stretch her wings toward the south?" - Job 39:26
- No; the hawk flies because it was programmed by its creator to do so. It's not only intelligence that we see in the world, but divine wisdom. Wisdom is something over and above intelligence, as we can plainly see by observing intelligent people do and say stupid things. Wisdom in the sense meant here refers to seeing the whole picture, to seeing the entire ecological system and how it interacts.

- M. Johnson

Notes;
1. Designed for Flight - Paul Bartz
2. Scales functions;
'The scales of a snake primarily serve to reduce friction as it moves, since friction is the major source of energy loss in
snake locomotion. The ventral (or belly) scales, which are large and oblong, are especially low-friction, and some arboreal species can use the edges to grip branches. Snake skin and scales help retain moisture in the animal's body. - wiki
- It wouldn't surprise me if scales had undiscovered functions.
4. Scale functions
Movement;
The scales on some reptiles assist the reptile with movement. In the case of snakes, the snake's belly scales are able to grab onto tiny imperfections on surfaces and create friction to propel the snake forward.
Protection;
The thick, prickly scales on a reptile can help protect it from predators. They can make it difficult for predators to bite or attack the reptile, as well as cause injury to the predator.
In the case of other reptiles, the color of the scales can provide a defense against attack. One example of this is the non-venomous milk snake, whose black and red ringed pattern resembles that of the highly venomous coral snake.
Water Retention;
Reptiles living in the desert have evolved special adaptations that allow them to thrive in the hot and dry climate. The scales of many desert reptile species allow them to retain moisture by preventing the evaporation of water through the skin. This allows the animal to become dehydrated less frequently and require smaller amounts of water to survive.
Camouflage;
The scales of many reptile species are either plainly or elaborately colored to assist with camouflage. This includes certain species of leaf-tail geckos, who can completely blend in to surrounding tree trunks and branches in their natural environment. [ehow.com]
5. 'Even the most clever rebuilding of a reptile cannot produce a bird. In fact, birds have very little in common with reptiles. The entire being of the bird, from body to brain, has been specially designed for flight by a Creator who clearly knows everything there is to know about flight. - Bartz; above
6. I was thinking of giving this post the title 'Affrayed to fly' but resisted the temptation.

The museum delusion

2011-12-01T10:04:00.000-08:00

Museums devoted to displaying the Darwin story have carefully, and deliberately painted a false picture of the fossil record. I wonder how many people are aware of the deceptions involved in this supposedly educational enterprise.

Quotes and comments;

1. "Paleontologists have found 432 mammal species in the dinosaur layers….But where are these fossils? We visited 60 museums but did not see a single complete mammal skeleton from the dinosaur layers displayed at any of these museums.'' [1.]

- Here is plain proof that evolutionists are deliberately falsifying the fossil record so as to create a delusory myth in the minds of the public. How can anyone trust the people who do this kind of thing? Why would anyone expect people like this to be honest when talking about the origins debate? They clearly have no interest in the truth, but care only about propagating a myth.

- Here is clear evidence that refutes the great Darwinian myth, as these collections just should not happen according to textbook theory. Anyone who accepts cosmic evolution in the light of these findings does so despite the evidence not because of the evidence.

Many (most?) natural history museums have more to do with the muses than with science, and are shrines to materialism and cosmic evolution.

2. 'Werner also learned that dinosaur-containing rock layers have "fossilized examples from every major invertebrate animal phylum living today," and that dinosaurs were mixed in with varieties of fish, amphibians, "parrots, owls, penguins, ducks, loons, albatross, cormorants, sandpipers, avocets, etc." [1.]

- The Darwinian myth has been carefully manufactured, and bears little relationship to reality. The museums are temples devoted to cosmic evolution, as the scenarios they paint (and present) are fictional... and are very little different than Disneyland. One day they'll be seen as the amusement parks they really are.

This is a prime example of what's known as the engineering (or manufacturing) of consent. The success of Darwinism is almost entirely due to the false (iconic) pictures and images evolutionists have invented and painted for the public mind. Without the (false) images the words would mean nothing.

3. “Few are aware of the great number of mammal species found with dinosaurs. Paleontologists have found 432 mammal species in the dinosaur layers; almost as many as the number of dinosaur species. These include nearly 100 complete mammal skeletons." [4.]

- Fossils are the sacred relics of Evolution, the sacred stones of naturalist religion, and the natural history museum is the modern Pantheon, where the inner sanctum always seems to feature that lumbering saint of Darwinism, the dinosaur.

These Darwinian displays are a good example of the Potemkin village, as they're utterly fake and bear little resemblance to reality. The fact you display a bone is meaningless in itself, as it's the context that makes all the difference. In most cases it's not the bones that are displayed that is important, it's the bones that are not displayed which is crucial. These displays could be compared to the sets Hollywood used to make and use, and they have as little educational value.

Summary;
Museum directors see themselves as guardians of cosmic evolution and as members of an elite who is going to cure the common folk of their delusions, since they're too incompetent to do it on their own. (Curators of museums now see themselves as curators of the soul.) What we have in many of these deceptive presentations is a more up to date version of Piltdown Man.

- M. Johnson

Notes;
1. Dinosaur Fossil 'Wasn't Supposed to Be There' - by Brian Thomas
Full quotation; 'Medical doctor Carl Werner actually used fossil-related criteria as a test for evolution. He reasoned that if the evolutionary story were true and that dinosaurs lived in a unique "Age of Reptiles," and if everyday natural processes were responsible for their fossilization, then no fossils of creatures from other "ages"—for example, creatures that had not yet evolved—should be mixed up with dinosaur fossils.
But Werner found that a fossil mixture of very different kinds was typical. He told Creation magazine:
''Paleontologists have found 432 mammal species in the dinosaur layers….But where are these fossils? We visited 60 museums but did not see a single complete mammal skeleton from the dinosaur layers displayed at any of these museums.''
3. Bird Fossils Offer Clues to Dinosaur Question
by Brian Thomas
'Similarly swampy menageries characterize many Cretaceous fossil sites. For example, one study of fossilized dinosaur skin stated that the Lance Formation in North America contained "remains of cartilaginous and bony fishes, amphibians, champsosaurs, turtles, lizards, snakes, crocodilians, pterosaurs, dinosaurs, birds, and mammals."4
Also, an inventory of fossils in the Straight Cliffs Formation at the Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument in Utah reported "plants, petrified wood, leaves, carbonized wood, pollen, corals, bryozoans, snails, clams, ammonoids, sharks, fish, salamanders, frogs, turtles, lizards, crocodiles, pterosaurs, dinosaurs, [and] mammals."5 The researchers also reported fossilized birds in the layers above.
4. “Few are aware of the great number of mammal species found with dinosaurs. Paleontologists have found 432 mammal species in the dinosaur layers;3 almost as many as the number of dinosaur species. These include nearly 100 complete mammal skeletons. But where are these fossils? We visited 60 museums but did not see a single complete mammal skeleton from the dinosaur layers displayed at any of these museums. This is amazing. Also, we saw only a few dozen incomplete skeletons/single bones of the 432 mammal species found so far. Why don’t the museums display these mammal fossils and also the bird fossils?”
Living fossils: a powerful argument for creation
Don Batten interviews Dr Carl Werner, author of Living Fossils (Evolution: the Grand Experiment vol. 2)
5. Evolutionists treat the fossil record like a Rosetta stone when they have no right to. i.e. they have no outside (objective) source to use to interpret the data. If the bible is what it claims to be then the Biblical creationist has the 'Rosetta stone' needed. (E. theory isn't objective; though it's treated as if it were.)
6. After I wrote this post I was surprised to find a copy of Living Fossils at the library. I suppose someone must have donated it, because whoever runs the place is fiercely anti-creation. (You find many more books condemning any kind of creation than you find books by creationists; not to mention every book by an evolutionist you can think of.) I recommend it highly. It's a joy to look it, apart from being informative and challenging.

Deconstructing natural selection

2011-11-25T12:40:00.000-08:00

One of the great myths of our day is the idea of a creative natural selection. In this post I'll make a couple comments on a review of the book 'Genetic Entropy & The Mystery of the Genome' by John C. Sanford

Quotes and comments;

1. 'Any trait such as intelligence, speed or strength depends on gene characteristics and environmental factors (nutrition, training, etc.) For example, height is about 30% (h2 = 0.3) heritable. For complex traits such as ‘fitness’ heritability values are low (i.e. 0.004). ‘This is because total fitness combines all the different types of noise from all the different aspects of the individual.’ Low heritability means bad genotypes are very difficult to eliminate. Survival becomes primarily a matter of luck, and not better genes: [1.]

- When darwin famously said that 'nature' could do more than animal breeders he wasn't being honest, but what he failed to mention was crucial; if you take animals that have been bred for a purpose and then turn them loose, those specially bred charactersistics will soon disappear and the animal will revert to norm.
The godlike creative powers of natural selection is an utter myth.

2. 'Furthermore, almost all mutations are recessive, camouflaging their presence and hindering selection against them (pp. 56, 76). Another consideration, not explicitly brought out in this book, is that key environmental factors (disease, temperature, mutation, predators, etc.) affecting survival vary over time. Strong selection must be present for a huge number of generations if fixation of a (temporarily) favourable trait throughout a population is to occur. Relaxation for just a few generations could undo this process, since selection for a different trait would then be at the expense of the preceding one.

- The textbook model of how n.s. works is a rationalistic construct bearing little resemblance (in most cases) to reality.

3. 'We must recognize clearly this lack of strong correlation between a mutation (whether having a positive or negative effect) and reproductive success. It is a fact of nature, yet most people attribute incorrectly near miraculous creative powers to natural selection.

- The collapse of the natural selection myth leaves Darwinism in tatters... a flag reduced to a few threads.

4. '...the degradation of the human genome (in the presence of such high mutations rates, preponderance of deleterious mutations and lack of huge expendable proportions of offspring) cannot be avoided...'

- I see no way progressive evolution is possible under these circumstance.

5. 'In the 1950s, one of the most famous population geneticists, John Burdon Sanderson Haldane, presented an observation known as ‘Haldane’s dilemma’ (p. 128): it would take (on average) 300 generations to select a single new mutation to fixation. However, his calculations were only for independent, unlinked mutations. He assumed constant and very strong selection for a single trait, which is not realistic. The interference by hundreds of random mutations was not taken into account. Even so, selection for only 1,000 specific and adjacent mutations could not happen in all putative evolutionary time. There is no way an ape-like creature could have been transformed into a human (p. 129). Man and chimp differ at roughly 150 million nucleotide positions (p. 130) and humans show remarkably little variation worldwide.

- The actual case is far more extreme than Haldane could possibly have known. The famous Darwinian icon of a line of apes being slowly transformed into a human being is a completely fallacious invention. It's a travesty of education that this bit of propaganda is featured in textbooks for children.

- M. Johnson

Notes;
1. A review of Genetic Entropy & The Mystery of the Genome by John C. Sanford, Ivan Press, Lima, New York, 2005 - by Royal Truman

Darwinism and the theology of perfection

2011-11-22T11:55:00.000-08:00

Some popular apologists for cosmic evolution like to make the argument that because certain organs or processes in the biological world aren't perfect, this means they weren't created. We'd like to disagree.

Quotes and comment;

1. 'First, Dawkins levels the charge that much of what exists in nature is far from perfectly designed and is only good enough. [1.]

- The idea of perfection requires a standard, and since the evolutionist has no standard (for perfection) he's got no right to employ the term in his arguments. Perfection is an evaluation, and such valuation can only be made by a personal agent. In the case of the animal world, only the one who created the kinds knows what the standard of perfection is. When Genesis tells us god declared the creation to be very good, we assume this means perfect, but the text doesn't say this. When God says it was very good this means that the creation was what he intended it to be.

Dawkins plays the game of pretending he's never heard about the Fall, and that nowhere in the bible does it say (after the Fall) that anything is perfect; in fact it says the opposite, and points out the the whole earth is under a curse, and moans and travails...

It's unrealistic (unscientific?) to imagine a perfect creation would remain that way under conditions of entropy. One wonders what possible warrant e.s can have for demanding perfect 6,000 years after creation.

A common reason e.s give for rejecting creation is the idea x or y (e.g. the eye) isn't perfect. This is a strange and illegitimate argument, as they have taken a concept from geometry and applied it to living organisms. This is what we call a category mistake. There is no warrant for applying a geometric standard to something biological. (That said we know that there's not even any such thing as a perfect triangle; for geometry deals with 'imaginary' objects; and so it's perfection is ideal not physically real.)

The evolutionist claims that if god created everything it would be perfect. I'm not sure who first came up with this argument (and it has the whiff of ancient Greece about it) but it's simply fallacious. The argument depends upon men being able to know exactly who god is and how he would do things. If evolutionists read a little theology they'd know that this is not the Biblical view at all. Cornelius Van Til was from a line of thinkers who thought God was far beyond man's full comprehension.

This bit of Darwinian theology is a straw man argument, as there is nothing in the bible that would lead anyone to think this is a perfect world. (I can see how someone might get that idea if the first two chapters were as far in Genesis as they got, since there's a sense in which the world was perfect before the Fall; but after the Fall we are told the earth was cursed.)

As an aside; when God declares the creation to be good; to be very good, he isn't saying this in the sense he's surprised or pleased with how things came out, as if he were saying ''boy it came out as good as I'd hoped'' or somesuch. No; he's saying this for the benefit of mankind, as He is well aware of what is going to happen, and He wants to see that the blame for the coming 'imperfection' goes where it should.

We have no right to employ the standard of perfection to living organisms; and even more especially to man. Unfortunately this is what we so often do; and you can ride the train and hear people complain about the fact their jobs aren't perfect, their marriages aren't perfect, their lives aren't perfect, and so on. You'd think they were triangles and squares at heart, or had been so in a previous life. They then go about solving the problem of imperfection; getting rid of an imperfect mate and beginning a search for a perfect one, and so on.

It's interesting to me that the best the evolutionist can do to critique the Genesis account is to hold it up to a fallacious, unrealistic and bogus standard.

In an entropic universe there is no way that there could still be perfection 6,000 (or more) years after creation. No biblical creationist denies mutations and damage to the genome; the universe being what it is, this is inevitable. The bible does not say the world is perfect, and even the atheist is well aware that it doesn't. ("The creation moaneth and travaileth,'' we read in Romans.) The 'imperfections' that we see in the world (and in ourselves) are just what we would expect given the Genesis account of creation. (I seem to remember reading that each individual inherits as many as 60 mutations. At this rate there would have been a lot of damage in 6,000 years.)

One response you get from atheists is ''well since you people think all things are possible with god, then god could have maintained a perfect creation, and if he's all good, as you say, then he would have. Since the world isn't perfect god doesn't exist.''

This isn't science, it's speculation. It might be even be true that God could have done this, but we're told that this is not what he did. The whole creation fell under a curse because of man's sin. (This may have been more a matter of withholding of grace as it were, instead of an active curse. i.e. perfection might have required a continuing work on God's part to maintain it, and when the fall occurred God ended or curtailed this upholding of things.)

- M.D. Johnson

Notes;
1. River Out of Eden: A Darwinian View of Life by Richard Dawkins - Reviewed by Raymond G. Bohlin
2. Perfect; adj
- early 13c., from O.Fr. parfit (11c.), from L. perfectus "completed," pp. of perficere "accomplish, finish, complete," from per- "completely" + facere "to perform" (see factitious). Often used in English as an intensive (perfect stranger, etc.). The verb meaning "to bring to full development" is recorded from late 14c.
A. Completely corresponding to a description, standard, or type: a perfect circle; a perfect gentleman.
- the general image is of a craftsman making some object (e.g. a chair) gradually putting it together, finishing it, perfecting it, making it as close to the model as possible. (We all know it won't stay 'perfect' for long :=} The Darwinist is in the hopeless position of trying to explain perfection as the result of a long line of accidents and chance events.
b. Being without defect or blemish: a perfect specimen.

The miracle of abiogenesis

2011-11-21T14:27:00.000-08:00

I don't think many people realize that cosmic evolution requires a series of miracles.

Quotes and comments;

1. 'German pathologist Rudolf Virchow succeeded in formulating the ‘law of biogenesis’ (‘all cells from cells’) in 1855, and Frenchman Louis Pasteur used it to refute the idea of spontaneous generation in 1864. [1.]

- A materialist origin for the biosphere would have to violate the law of biogenesis; but wait, aren't we told we can't believe in miracles because they violate natural law, and that nothing can violate natural law? The theory of evolution necessitates a miracle then, as it requires a violation of natural law. The idea life can 'emerge' from non-life cannot be called science as it goes against all that we know.

2. 'Twenty years later in 1855 Rudolf Virchow proposed an important extension of cell theory that "All living cells arise from pre-existing cells". ("Omnis cellula e celula") This statement has become what is known as the "Biogenic law". This idea flew in the face of current doctrine. It implied that there was no spontaneous creation of cells from non-living matter. [3.]

- I find it comical that the champions of naturalistic science have adopted a theory (cosmic evolution) that requires a violation of natural law. Life from non-life is an a-theistic miracle. Why is so few of our academics and scientists seem to care?

- M. Johnson

Notes;
1. A review of Science as a Way of Knowing: The Foundations of Modern Biology by John A. Moore; Book Review by Alex Williams
2. 'In natural science, abiogenesis or biopoesis is the study of how biological life arises from inorganic matter through natural processes, and the method by which life on Earth arose. - wiki
3. http://kentsimmons.uwinnipeg.ca/cm1504/celltheory.htm

Evidence for a young earth

2011-11-20T09:25:00.000-08:00

Most people you talk to (outside of some small church circles) think the idea we live on a young earth is an absurd notion; they think this because they've never been acquainted with any good arguments for the young earth position. Contrary to what people think, there are many good reasons to question an old age for the earth, and to affirm a young earth.

Quotes and comments;

1. 'No scientific method can prove the age of the earth and the universe, and that includes the ones we have listed here. Although age indicators are called “clocks” they aren’t, because all ages result from calculations that necessarily involve making assumptions about the past. Always the starting time of the “clock” has to be assumed as well as the way in which the speed of the clock has varied over time. Further, it has to be assumed that the clock was never disturbed. [1.]

- The article I just quoted from contains a long list of evidences for a young earth. It includes a link to an article or essay for each one mentioned. It's a great resource for anyone interested in this subject.

Notes;
1. Age of the earth; 101 evidences for a young age of the earth and the universe - by Don Batten

There are no scientific laws

2011-11-19T17:59:00.000-08:00

I want to make a few comments on a review I read of the book 'Music to move the stars' written by Jane Hawking. It's about her marriage to the physicist Stephen Hawking.

Quotes and comments;

1. "...a Creator God was an awkward obstacle for an atheistic scientist whose aim was to reduce the origins of the universe to an unified package of scientific laws, expressed in equations and symbols." [1.]

- There's no such thing as scientific laws. The term 'scientific law' is a pretense meant to steal glory from God and to bring glory to man. The 'laws' we see (if you want to call our formulation of observed regularities laws) aren't scientific but universal; they have nothing to do with man as they aren't inventions but discoveries. (To the extent they're accurate formulations.)
So called 'scientific laws' are only human inventions to the extent they're false; then they become inventions along the lines of fantasy.

I don't see why the existence of God should be an obstacle to studying the universe. This makes no sense to me. Without God there would be no universe and no one to study it.

The major problem with Materialism is the drive to reduce things; to reduce the higher to the lower, to reduce the immaterial to the material. The great danger in this project is that the personal universe ends up becoming (in the eyes of adherents) an impersonal one; and that intelligence gets replaced by the material, and the intentional by chance. Far too many scientists in our day confuse reductionism as a tool to be used in research with a reductionism as a philosophy of life, as a worldview.

2. 'She [Jane] adds that, as a direct result of the focus of modern cosmologists on mathematics, the concept of a personal God became irrelevant for these scientists because, in their mind, their calculations diminished ‘any possible scope for a Creator’

- I wonder where people like Hawking think mathematics comes from? I wonder how they imagine mathematics is possible, or how it's possible for them to do math. I wonder if they even ask these questions. People are far too apt to take their capacities and abilities for granted. Evolutionary theory can't begin to explain how it is men have the intellectual potential they do. This ought to give them pause to question their materialist worldview. You're in a poor (not to mention hopeless) situation if your basic worldview can't even begin to account for your own existence!

The materialist is too interested in the creation, and not interested enough in the creator. It surely makes sense to think that the creator is much more 'interesting' (awesome) than His creation. Surely the One who created mathematics and creatures capable of comprehending mathematics is someone worth getting to know. The christian believes the creator has far more interesting 'tricks' up His sleeve than the material universe (astounding as it is) Hawking has become obsessed with. ("We as of yet see through a glass darkly...") [2.] The apostle Paul (in Romans) speaks of those who worship the creation rather than the creator, and this is what Hawking appears to have done.

If you walk into a room and see equations covering a blackboard do you imagine no one wrote them?

Does the fact you can describe an object (e.g. a pyramid) in mathematical terms mean it wasn't created by someone?

3. "...‘they could not envisage any other place or role for God in the physical universe. Concepts which could not be quantified in mathematical terms as a theoretical reflection of physical realities, whether or not the actual existence of those physical realities was proven, were meaningless." (p. 155).

- People are making a category mistake when they imagine they can understand all things (especially God!) in terms of mathematics. God is far too great and too transcendent to be comprehended by mathematics. Hawking has made the cardinal mistake of ignoring the creator/creature distinction. He somehow imagines he can comprehend all of reality, but has no reason to believe a trousered ape is capable of any such thing. His own worldview (e.g.Darwinism) makes his statements about God and ultimate reality absurd. As Darwin hiimself said, ''why should we pay any attention to what an ape says about reality?" (I'm paraphrasing.)

A materialist is someone who has their nose pressed so tightly to the 'tree' they're studying that they can't see the forest; they're blinded by the physical. (The Hawking equation; Materialism = Reductionism = Absurdity)

4. "...many scientists ‘arrogantly even aspire to become gods themselves by denying the rest of us our freedom of choice and disputing our right to ask the question “Why?” in relation to the origins of the universe and the origins of life. They claim that the question is as … inappropriate, as it would be to ask why Mt. Everest is there.''

- Did these people forget that they're just animals, mere bits of matter, that their thoughts are just chemical reactions? It would appear so. Who are they to tell anyone what's appropriate? If all is matter in motion nothing is appropriate or inappropriate. People will never stop asking why in any event; it's a question from the heart, a question that's part of us, a question we were meant to ask.

The reductionist has a dreary tendency to speak of human beings as if they're all the same. This comes from their reducing human beings to the physical, and the physical to the chemical. On the cellular level it's true that we are much alike (though we don't even lose our individuality at that level; you have to reduce people to the atomic level to destroy all their individuality) and this is why the reductionist lumps all people together. His reductionism leads him to feel that what he thinks is right for him must be right for everyone; that's what he thinks is true must be true for everyone.

We don't ask why Mt. Everest is there because a mountain is not a person. (You wouldn't think we'd have to explain this, but apparently, in the case of the hardboiled atheist we do.) It's typical of course for the materialist to ignore personality and individuality... although there's something comical about a personal being denying the importance of personhood. (It's akin to a cat denying the importance of whiskers, or a bird denying the importance of wings.)

5. "They dismiss the suggestion that the question ‘Why’ is the prerogative of theologians and philosophers rather than scientist because, they say, theologians are engaged in the “study of fantasy.”

- It's true that some theologians are engaged in the study of fantasy, but so are some scientists. [e.g. the multiverse, imaginary time, etc.] The fact that many theologians are studying false gods and false scripture doesn't prove that a living creator God doesn't exist, or that He hasn't given us His revealed word.

Reductionism means the 'extinction' of the theologian or the moralist (the artist, etc.) as all studies must be reduced to physics. There's a great imperialism involved in the reductionist project, as it allows only a physicalist account of the universe (and that includes the 'universe' of human beings).

As someone who takes the creationist perspective, I believe that much of Darwinism is a study of fantasy; especially as it involves the 'just so' stories that populate the 'soft' sciences. e.g. evolutionary psychology, Darwinist literary critique, evolutionary sociology, etc.

6. "Their theories reduce the whole of Creation to a handful of material components."

- The biggest problem with reductionism is that it does away with intelligence as an integral part of the universe. (I find it comical that some of our most intelligent people deny the role of intelligence. This is akin to fish denying the role of gills, or birds denying the role of feathers.) Materialism is, at best, half an adequate account of the universe. The materialist is akin to the 'head' of a coin denying that a 'tail' side exists; it's akin to the cover of a book denying the pages exist.

- M. D. Johnson

Notes;
1. 100. Stephen Hawking: the closed mind of a dogmatic atheist; A review of Music to Move the Stars by Jane Hawking - Book Review by Jerry Bergman
2. "Now we see things imperfectly, like puzzling reflections in a mirror, but then we will see everything with perfect clarity. All that I know now is partial and incomplete, but then I will know everything completely, just as God now knows me completely.'' 1 Cor 13:12 [NLT}
3. I've gotten so far behind on my reading list, that I've taken to reading book reviews to try and catch up.

The word of life

2011-11-06T07:58:00.000-08:00

Erwin Schrodinger wrote a book called 'What is life?' and the question remains one of perennial interest. I believe we find the only true answer to this question in the Bible.

Quotes and comments;

1. "In the beginning was the word, and the word was with god and the word was God.
The same was in the beginning with God.
All things were made by Him, and without him was not anything made that was made.
In him was life; and the life was the light of men.'' - [John 1:1-4]

- For Christianity life is a matter of intelligence, the wisdom of the all powerful, all knowing, eternal God. The source of all things is the intelligence and wisdom of God.

Life is for the Christian a revelation of God, it's evidence of God's existence. In life we see something of God and God's nature. It is God revealing himself to us. We take life for granted for the same reason fish take water for granted, but in doing so we make a grievous mistake. We should meditate on the miracle that is life, for it is not the 'natural' product of matter plus time that the Materialist tells us it is.

In living organisms we see how God can make the impossible possible. Every day we stare at miracles on every side. Without the wisdom and creativity of God all that would exist (at best) would be inert matter. We often hear people wonder 'why there is something rather than nothing' and the answer is God. We look around and say with wonder, 'it's impossible that this should exist' - and without God, it would be.

In some sense life is something all organisms and God share, for God is alive even as we are alive; God lives even as we live. All creatures are animated by the divine intelligence that created and informed them at the Creation. We can think of life as intelligence and wisdom. All creatures are the 'incarnation' of divine intelligence.

2. John (1 John 1:1,3) speaks of Jesus as the 'word of life.'

- In creation we see the word of life made manifest. Life on the earthly realm can only come from life, and God is life itself. What we call life is better seen as intelligence; it can have no merely physical origin.

3. 'Because God made all things, all things are revelational of God; they witness to the triune God. [3.]

- In the creation we see that the wisdom of God makes the impossible possible or manifest. In terms of human wisdom the universe is impossible, but yet it exists. The incongruity of our existence is more something to praise than to puzzle over. Some people say the universe is impossible, some say that God is impossible, and if we rely on human understanding this will be as far as we get. The fact the impossible exists is evidence that our understanding is incomplete, is evidence of something beyond us, something transcending us.

We have no evidence life can come from non-life, this phantasm is something no one has observed. What we do have (in the gospel of John and elsewhere) are the observations and experience of men and women who saw in the figure of Jesus, Life itself. It's to our great demerit that men will search test tubes for signs of life, but will not search the scriptures for the 'living word' - for Life itself. The word was the origin of life, and He is not hiding and is available for all to see.

4. 'Others have called attention to the fact ''in the beginning'' can also mean ''at the root of the universe.'' [4.]

- The true tree of life has Christ at its base; for Christ is the 'common ancestor' of all creatures.

5. "And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, (and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father,) full of grace and truth. - John 1:14

- We see in the incarnation (the son of God, walking as man in the world) something of the 'mechanics' of creation; for living organisms (including man) are the 'incarnations' of God's wisdom; they are god's wisdom made manifest, they are god's wisdom clothed in flesh. The creatures (kinds) of the original creation were words (small w) made flesh... small harbingers of the day the Word would be made flesh.

'Peter speaks of life as grace from God.' [6]

- This verse appears to be referring to spiritual grace granted to the christian, but I think it can be seen in a more general light as well. i.e. our existence can be seen as an act of favor and goodness freely given to us by God.

The life given to Adam was a gift, an act of grace, and we all share in that gift. There is nothing in matter that merits life; life is unmerited grace.

- M. Johnson

Notes;
3. Gospel of John - R. J. Rushdoony p. 2.
- book available free online at Chalcedon.org
4. above
5. In Genesis we're told that god 'breathed' into Adam and he became a living soul. I wonder if we can translate this as god spoke to Adam and he became a living soul. i.e. it was the 'word' (the intelligence) of God that brought clay alive.
- in psalm 33:6 we're told that the heavens were made by the ''breath of his mouth.''
6. 'Peter speaks of life as grace from God.' [1 Peter 3:7] above p.6
Grace;
a. 'An act of kindness or favor accorded to or bestowed on another; a good turn or service freely rendered.'
7. John 1:14

Doing science in the clouds

2011-10-31T11:13:00.000-07:00

We often hear the charge that biblical creation is inimical to science. In an essay written some years ago John King did a good job of refuting this claim.

Quotes and comments;

1. 'Apart from the biblical doctrine of creation there can be no science since a unified theory of scientific knowledge becomes impossible in the absence of a created order or a receptive human mind.' [1.]

- Apart from the biblical doctrine of creation there can be no unified theory of scientific knowledge, as materialism separates the human knower from the known universe. Only in the biblical model are man and universe parts of an integrated whole; as the One who made man made the universe, and He blessed man with the ability to know the universe. The materialist definitions of man and universe make the universe [theoretically] unknowable. i.e. if all were in fact mere matter in motion there would be no one to know, and nothing to be known; there would merely be various bits of matter. (Does one rock know another rock?) The universe and man were made as hand and glove for each other; and man was blessed not only with a transcendent capacity to understand and comprehend, but with the desire to do so.

In the materialist model both man and universe are mere accidents, wildly improbable incidents without cause or meaning; and neither was made for the other. It is a wild improbability that the accident man even exists, and he has no inherent (or integral) connection with the world or with the universe. Materialist science thus has no unified theory of scientific knowledge. This makes their typical definitions of 'science' inadequate at best, as they want to define science without giving us a unified theory of scientific knowledge. Lacking such a theory their definitions are bit more bits of matter circulating in the void. If all is matter in motion so are definitions; if matter has no cause, truth or meaning neither do definitions.

Man only has the ability to understand the universe because he had/has a creator who transcends the universe; our ability to transcend matter comes from a creator who transcends matter. I see no other explanation for this, and no other explanation for science. While the materialist likes to laud science over biblical faith, he has no explanation for its very existence or for man's ability to understand. Materialism as an explanation stands as far beneath creation as an adequate model as the monkey stands beneath man. It's a gross and gibbering thing, a mere howling at the moon. It can't account for science any more than a chimp can account for itself.

2. '...since knowledge must be grasped by a knowing mind it is a personal concept and, thus presupposes a cosmic personalism. [1.]

- In our day we forget that all knowledge is (on one level) personal, as it is always knowledge grasped by a personal being. This makes all knowledge personal knowledge. The materialist presents us with a picture of an impersonal universe, and thus creates a chasm between man the personal agent and an impersonal universe. So great and wide is this chasm that the materialist usually turns his back on it and walks away. Since he can't deal with it he ignores it. Biblical creation (I hesitate to call it a model) on the other hand gives us a personal universe, and thus we don't have the radical divide between the personal knower and the universe.

The materialist struggles to give us an explanation for how we can have personal agents in an impersonal universe. I find all the stories on how this could have happened implausible. By any common reading of the laws of physics personal agents have no right to exist, and should not exist... but yet they do, and yet here we are. The materialist likes to focus his science on the material because he can't comprehend what looks back at him in the mirror. He thinks he understands the known but he can't understand the knower; but in that case how can he be sure he knows the universe. i.e. if he doesn't understand himself how can he be sure of what he claims to know? Knowledge doesn't exist in a void; it is always knowledge held by a personal agent. Apart from biblical creation, the biggest threat to materialism is always skepticism.

3. 'Van Til has repeatedly argued the only alternatives to christian theism are fate... and flux...' [1.]

- i.e. all is the fate of physical cause and effect or all is chance. The materialist must found any unified theory of scientific knowledge on either fate or flux. (The usual thinker flip flops between these alternatives and fails to give us a consistent account.) If all is fate then no freedom of thought or action is possible, and thus no true science can exist, as man can only say what he is fated to say. If all is flux truth doesn't and can't exist, as there is no objective reality only the subjective perception of an ever changing parade.

All men are presented with the choice between a personal (infinite) being and fate or flux; and all science (all scientific endeavors) must be founded on one of the three views of the universe. We thus have the science of fate, the science of flux or the science of the personal.

- M. Johnson

Notes;
1. Creation according to the scriptures; a presuppositional defense of literal, six day creation edited by Andrew Sandlin (Ch. 10. Creation and science - John King p. 103)
- available free online at Chalcedon.org
2. Materialism always has the challenge of explaining rationality in an irrational universe (of personality in an impersonal universe, of intelligence in a non-intelligent universe; of morality in an amoral universe; of life in an inert universe). Since the challenge materialism faces is so daunting its advocates much prefer attacking Christianity than defending their own position :=} One can hardly blame them. I certainly wouldn't want to play Sisyphus for them.
3. Many materialists like to call creation a myth, but the biblical view is that it is materialism which is the myth. Van Til saw the idea the world and man can come from the collisions of atoms as a great myth. It's surely the most implausible idea ever to tumble from the forehead of man. He saw Naturalist science as founded on the the myth of materialism. ("One day a fish walked out of the sea and uttered a syllogism..." or "One day a big fish washed up on the seashore and out walked a philosopher...")
4. Since Van Til believed the bible to be the infallible word of the creator God he claimed that modern (naturalistic) science was doomed to failure, and that the bigger its claims the more fallacious they would turn out to be. The bible and materialist science cannot both be correct about the origins of the universe, of the world, of living organisms or of man himself. He was of the opinion materialist science would never find the answers to the big questions. The textbook science of our day is only correct to the extent it restricts itself to being descriptive. (If man were truly good, as the Humanist usually insists he is, he would, in humility, restrict himself to empirical description. Any description of the creation is at the same time a word of praise to its creator. Any science that denies to God the 'ownership' [authorship] of the universe has gone from praise to blasphemy and idolatry.)
5. The biblical model' of reality is dualistic, while the materialist model is monistic. I don't see how these can both be correct. We thus have two models of science; the dualistic one (of c. theism) and the monistic one of materialism. (i.e. if all is matter in motion, all is one) We thus have a transcendent realm in the theistic model and have none in the monistic model. This means the materialist model (being monist) can't ever get outside or beyond itself .
- in the Naturalistic model matter somehow (we can't imagine how, but we only know it did) managed to transcend itself and become man; become a personal, intelligent, self-aware consciousness. There is no explanation for how this might have happened; nor will there ever be. It's simply held by apostate man as an article of faith. It defies any expectation of we can have for physical matter. (We base our lives on an expectation matter will NOT transcend itself; for our lives would be impossible were this to happen on a regular basis :=} For this to happen matter would have to act in a way matter has never be known to act; it would have to defy its own constitution.
6. Since man can only understand what is rational, it follows that the universe must be rational for man to understand it; and for it to be rational it must have been created by a rational being in terms of a rational plan or design. If there were a godless universe, if such a thing were possible (and let's posit one for the sake of argument) it would be an irrational chaos and thus unknowable. I can't imagine a rational creature existing in such a universe, but if we were to drop one into it he would be able to understand nothing, for you can't understand the purely irrational. If any creature were to emerge in such a universe it would itself be irrational, and thus you would have an irrational creature trying to understand the irrational.
- Having said this I can't imagine an irrational universe nor any kind of intelligent creature in it. I see no way there can be intelligence in an irrational universe, and the fact we are intelligent creatures is evidence to me ours was created a rational universe.
7.
116. 'In addition to a created order, however, science requires a receptive mind.'
- i.e. is man capable of understanding reality? is he willing to accept the truth? etc. The bible tells us that man is not willing to accept the truth of his situation, and that only the gift of grace will allow him to do so. (The poets more readily admit this than scientists; ''Man cannot bear too much reality..'' as one of them has written.) It's a hard thing to admit the verity of a proposition you 'naturally' hate.
- when King speaks of science he means a true science; one rooted in reality.
8.
117. '...ethics and knowledge are intimately related.'
- We can say that all knowledge is both personal and ethical; as all knowledge requires an honest submission to the truth. As far as the ethical basis of knowledge pertains to science the questions are this; does something called the truth exist, can we know it, and are scientists able and willing to submit to it?
(If God does not exist, facts do not exist, and we're reduced to fighting over access to Tiamat's bones.) Truth requires a truth teller; and if there is no transcendent creator God, we are all sub gods engaged in perpetual conflict over the right to tell stories to the masses.
- secular thinkers like to counter the c. claim that the Fall has affected science by turning him into a rebel that can't affirm God by saying ''science is self-correcting.'' This means that even if c.s were correct in their views science as a whole wouldn't be affected as the continuing community will eventually weed out false ideas... even out of a miserly, self-serving spirit. How true is this? If all the scientists in a group are unregenerate and rebels against God will they ever correct the errors this mindset has caused them to make? We can't equate all errors, as some have deeper spiritual significance than others. e.g. will atheists ever correct the 'truth' of materialism? will atheists ever correct the 'truth' of cosmic evolution? Since science is only an abstraction and not a personal being it can't transcend the fallenness of natural man.
- the secular scientist assures us all that his motives in research are solely good. We need to worry about a lot of people surely, but not about scientists as they are the snow that falls upon and covers the soil and refuse of humanity, turning it from foul to fair. We need to be naive indeed to accept such a self-congratulatory and self-covering [defensive] message. This message contradicts what we are told in biology textbooks of course; where we are presented with a view of life that features an amoral struggle of all against all for survival and prominence. If the Darwinian message is true the claim of a messianic science cannot be.
9.
118. '...in the Babylonian account man is basically created from an evil substance (Kingu's blood) by evil gods. Evil is thus a metaphysical problem, built into the fabric of the universe, and thus an unalterable quality.'
- In the modern Darwinian account man is the descendent of apes and thus the 'evil' he does stems from his animal ancestry. (How it is man is far worse in the evil he does is rarely explained.) Evil is thus seen (as it was for the Babylonians) as a metaphysical problem not an ethical one. When people see evil as a metaphysical problem they provide 'technical' solutions to evil, not ethical or moral one, and this tends to mean they recommend statist solutions rather than personal; the solution then becomes political rather than spiritual. To make evil metaphysical is to bring the nose of political tyranny into the communal tent.
- Materialist science is inherently statist, and we see this working out of its potential all around us. e.g. since all evil is metaphysical all problems are technical problems and this thus requires a statist solution; and statist solutions require abandoning individual liberty and conscience. Despite the claims of its apologists, naturalistic science doesn't offer an escape from metaphysics, only an escape from Christian metaphysics. (There is no escape from metaphysics.) People have a choice of liberty under God's law, or tyranny under man's law; and this applies as much (or more) to science as it does to everything else. Since the secular scientist agrees with the statist policy makers he deludes himself into thinking he's free to do science as he pleases, but he only needs to look at the biblical creationist to see how free he really is. (There's no such thing as science outside a worldview or model; we either do science under the 'model' of biblical creation or under some other model; and since models are made by persons there can be no neutral model or any neutral science.)

The depressing news about Darwinism

2011-10-10T11:22:00.000-07:00

A modern curse emanating from academia is the field called evolutionary psychology. I want to make a few comments on how it views depression.

Quotes and comments;

1. 'It's reasonable to speculate that the reason depression exists is that it is an adaptive response, hard wired into us because it has survival value.' [1.]

- Is this a 'reasonable' claim, or is it just Darwinian storytelling? It's only 'reasonable' if you insist on believing in evolutionary theory - if you do, then it's not only reasonable but necessary. The textbooks tell students all behavior exists because of an evolutionary adaptation that produced advantages in the battle for survival. This being the case, O'Connor Must believe depression has survival value. Darwinism has seriously led him astray. (In my view, Darwinism is a dementia that renders bright, educated people into fools.) [2.]

A belief in Darwinism leads to many similar (and absurd) ideas; not only does depression have survival value, but every other mental condition, including sexual perversion, violence and every other negative behavior. [3.]

2. 'Depression 'may be adaptive for the species if it gets us to retreat in the face of danger or overwhelming obstacles, or cease misguided efforts to get what we want if if just no available, or step back from situations that might just work out if we leave them alone.' [1.]

- We need to be depressed to do these things! What it takes to do these things in intelligence, not depression. How then does such a ridiculous idea get transcribed into our school books? Simple. The Darwinian model posits a proto man who has no real intelligence so he relies on depression to get him to act in a wise or intelligent fashion. The biblical model denies such a creature ever existed. It doesn't see depression as a positive thing.

- M. Johnson

Notes;
1. Undoing Perpetual Stress - Richard O'Connor p. 247.
2. Hard wired? If he means a gene that directly causes depression that seems doubtful.
3. Are we supposed to believe human beings could exist without depression? Are we supposed to believe that one day man will evolve into a creature who no longer gets depressed? (O'Connor is someone who believes human misery is caused by a failure of the central nervous system to evolve to meet the stresses of modern life.)

An argument against long ages

2011-10-08T11:35:00.001-07:00

One of the biggest problems with textbook evolutionary theory is the widespread phenomenon of stasis.

Quotes and comments;

In responding to a critique of evolutionary theory that featured an argument from stasis, an evolutionist stated;

1. "There is no written rule that says a lineage has to die out just because an offspring develops a beneficial mutation. The theory of evolution explains how species change over time, it doesn’t say that all species must change over time.'' [1.]

- Textbook theory tells us all organisms suffer mutations on a regular basis; how can that not lead to change if this goes on for millions of years! How many mutations would there be over 10 million, or 50 million years? Just one mutation a year would mean millions of mutations; and what if there were dozens (or more) a generation? Stasis over millions of years seems clearly impossible given all the mutations involved. To me, stasis disproves long ages (i.e. millions of years.)

2. "As long as a species can survive in its environment and pass on its genetic information to its offspring, it can survive indefinitely. It doesn’t mean that the “living fossil” didn’t speciate, it just means those possible splits died out while the original lineage was able to always successfully reproduce even into today." [1.]

- Some Darwinists like to define evolution simply as change; so change is obviously at the heart of the theory, and this makes stasis a huge challenge, whether some people want to admit it or not. According to the reader above, evolution theory not only explains change it explains lack of change. Is any theory that flexible a scientific theory at all? How could one disprove such a self-contradictory theory? [3.]

- This evolutionist wants us to believe the superior version died out and in the inferior original surived! That is Not what evolution textbooks teach. For a mutation to survive it has to have an advantage.

- Evolutionary theory as I was taught it states that as conditions change animals must change; that the ones best adapted to changing conditions will survive. According to the textbooks conditions on earth have changed radically, not only once but many times over the history of life forms on the planet. How then can there be stasis for millions of years? [6.]

- M. Johnson

Notes;
1. Living fossils and evolution, and does it matter if ‘junk DNA’ has functions? [Q+A]
Don Batten
2. People who favor creation like to point to 'living fossils' as evidence against evolutioary theory, and evidence for creation.
3. "Yes [says the evolutionist] I believe that animals have changed greatly over time (evolution), but some animals and plants were so well adapted to the environment that they did not need to change. So I am not bothered at all by living fossils."
'This added hypothesis says that some animals did not evolve. But if a theory can be so flexible, adding hypotheses that predict the opposite of your main theory, one could never disprove the theory.' - Werner
4. 'All organisms undergo mutations. There is no special mechanism that prevents mutations such that many organisms can remain the same for supposedly hundreds of millions of years.
5. 'Remarkable stasis of a fossil ostracode with soft parts'
'This article remarks on an example of 425 million years of stasis: In that time-frame, evolution by mutations and natural selection has supposedly changed some (unidentified) worm into all the species of fish, amphibians, reptiles, birds, mammals (including elephants and mice, and of course, us). At the same time all the land plants have supposedly evolved. Such is the claimed power of evolution to change things, and yet these ostracodes remained unchanged (and many others ‘dated’ even older).
6. 'Note also that according to the evolutionary story, the predators for organisms have supposedly evolved and this means that the environment for virtually every organism changes. Furthermore, even the idea that the physical environment has remained stable contradicts evolutionary notions of global mass extinction events such as the Permian extinction (supposedly at 225 Ma) and the Cretaceous extinction (65 Ma), through both of which the ostracodes and many other examples of ‘living fossils’ remained unchanged.'

The mindless universe

2011-09-28T10:05:00.000-07:00

While I doubt the idea of a multiverse in a physical sense, we do have a mulitverse in a philosophical sense. We have the personal universe of the Bible and we have the impersonal universe of Naturalism.

Quotes and comments;

1. 'The mindless nature of the post-Darwinian world is anti-rational. Mind is a late-comer in the universe and thus 'animal instincts' have a deeper roots and greater vitality. [1.]

- It's important to note that ancient Humanists saw nature as infused with reason, or a spirit of reason. The world presented to us by the Darwins is mindless; not only is God gone, but the reason that infused the universe and all things is gone as well.

The biblical view of the universe is that it was the creation of God, a creation of Mind. This means that man lives within a created order. This order is undergoing the effects of entropy to be sure, but it nontheless remains the work of an intelligent being. ("In Him we live and move and have our being.'') Mind then is no late-comer, but in fact preceded matter. The Christian who believes in the historicity of Genesis believes that mind existed from the very beginning.

The naturalist (or materialist) vision is very nearly the opposite to the Christian. It presents us with an impersonal universe, where mind is a very recent development, and an alien in an otherwise mindless environment. The universe was not created, it was not the product of a mind; it is thus alien to the mind of man. (It's often called a mere epiphenomenon.) Who knows if it's not a 'will-of-the-wisp' here today, gone tomorrow; a brief flower in a dead universe.
The implication is that feelings are deeper and more powerful than mind; and that instincts trump ethics. Man is not responsible in this model because he's a slave to his animal heritage.

The idea that mind is a late-comer has had enormous influence on intellectual thought; especially on the arts.
Romanticism replaced reason with feelings; especially sexual feelings. The emphasis was not on the rational but on the emotional. i.e. the inspiration came not from reasoning and logic, but from feelings and passion; even from the irrational, the ugly, the frightful, anything that could provoke intense, powerful feelings. The idea of a mindless universe had consequences, and we see them around us in abundance.

I see Darwinism as an example of Romanticism; i.e. of Romantic literature. There is the same appeal to the primitive, to the animal, to instinct and passion. The idea nature is a struggle, and the survival of the fittest is a kind of Gothic vision. The terrors of the castle are replaced by the terrors of the jungle and the horrors of the stone age past.

2. Eric Newton said of the Romantics, ''they can never rejoice in the normal.'' [2.]

- What do we see in Charles Darwin? A delight in the abnormal. (e.g. his love of parasites) What is the idea all human behavior has its origin in animal activity but a delight in the abnormal? e.g. music has its origin in the mating calls of birds we're told by the Darwins; love is simply the animal instinct to reproduce; politics is simply hens involved in creating a pecking order; etc.

We can see that he was a Romantic in that he shared no enthusiasm for people like Marx and the desire to rebel (and for revolution) but rather a desire to escape, a desire to retire within his estate and to dream. The 'Origins' was his ghoulish masterpiece; a tale of the forbidden, the frightening, the ugly and the grotesque.

- M. Johnson

Notes;
1. The death of meaning - R. J. Rushdoony p.58
- available to read online at Chalcedon.edu [must register]
2. " p.59
3. We note that naturalists have gone from denying the existence of God to denying the existence of mind.
4. As Rushdoony says in his book; for the materialist, supernatural inspiration (i.e. the Bible) must be replaced with natural inspiration. If God didn't create the universe, the mind of man must create it. (He can't do this in reality, but he replaces the creation model of Genesis with a model of his own devising.)

Why what Jerry Coyne says isn't true

2011-09-27T10:45:00.000-07:00

A few comments on a review of Jerry Coyne's book; 'Why evolution is true'.

Quotes and comments;

1. 'Throughout this book, Coyne pontificates on what a Creator would not do. Incredibly, he asserts that a Creator would never make organisms that have convergent adaptations (p. 92). Consider man the creator. He uses convergent structures all the time as part of his designs. Caterpillar treads are convergent in military vehicles (tanks) and earthmoving equipment (caterpillar tractors). [1.]

- For Coyne to pretend he knows what a Creator would do is intellectual buffoonery; utterly without warrant. He has NO idea whatsoever what a creator would do. Like every atheist I know he denies and ignores the Creator/creature distinction. It's apparently impossible for him to imagine that God might be different than he is. He apparently believes his own mind to be ultimate and the determinator of all things; the standard for all judgment!

2. 'Coyne asserts that the unexplained origin of life is no problem for evolution because it is not part of evolutionary theory (p. 236). How convenient! In actuality, had the first cell arose by non-design means, it must have been the culmination of a long series of steps from more primitive life-forms and still-earlier quasi-life forms. If this is not evolution, then what is?

- Apparently the origin of life isn't a case of evolution because he says so. You see how huge the problem of the origin of life is for materialists when people like Coyne deny that it's part of E. theory. We see them running scared and hiding behind straw man attacks, ridicule and slander. It's evidence to me that they think the problem is unsolvable for them. If he included OOL in his definition he wouldn't be able to claim evolution is true. Why? Because he has no explanation for it. If you have no explanation you can't be right or wrong, and evolution can't be true or false.

OOL used to be a part of evolutionary theory, so what happened to make it drop out? A. No answer could be found, and all the OOL experiments were failures. How to deal with the colossal embarassment? Do what PR firms do; deny the problem exists. We see in Coyne's remark (and it's used by most evolutionists I'm familiar with) an admission of bafflement and defeat.

One wonders what's next; will evolutionists start claiming body plans aren't part of E. theory? that speciation isn't part of E. theory? that DNA isn't part of E. theory? that missing links aren't part of E. theory? that information isn't part of E. theory?

Some evolutionists claim OOL is part of e. theory and some claim it's not; so who should we believe? What game is being played here? Apparently were looking at two different groups; those who think E. theory should be completely free of problems, and those who feel it's alright to admit some problems. This looks like two different political strategies.

3. 'Predictably, Coyne would have us believe that “bad design” (as he and other evolutionists define it) could only imply that the Designer intentionally made things to look as if they had evolved.

- This is more Darwinian theology; and as Cornelius Hunter has pointed out, it's a main thrust in evolutionist rhetoric, as people can't resist speculating on what God would or would not do... should he exist. Let's turn the tables on them and point out that these theological speculations are scientific theories. Coyne has no idea what the Creator would or wouldn't do for the simple reason he doesn't (comprehensively) know the Creator. (You can't know what even another human being would do if you don't know them.)

4. 'Coyne tries to get around the humans-are-savages implications of evolution by pointing to societal advancements, such as the virtually universal rejection of the mortal gladiatorial combat of Roman times.

- We haven't gotten rid of 'gladiatorial combat' at all; all we've done is make it virtual, a spectacle of the screen. (Should the screens disappear one day, the physical combat will surely return, as the appetite seems as strong as ever.) The stronger response to Coyne's idea that man is getting better morally is that as a materialist he has no valid standard for judging such a thing. i.e. if all is matter in motion morality is at best an illusion.

Telling children they're really just animals seems like a funny thing to do if you expect them to become moral idealists when they become adults.

As W. notes, the 'progressivist' notion expounded by Coyne necessitates denying that there's anything wrong with abortion.

- M. Johnson

Notes;
1. Why evolution need not be true; A review of Why Evolution is True by Jerry A. Coyne - John Woodmorappe
2. 'In this review, I analyze the evolutionary arguments and do not generally attempt to present creationist alternatives, of which there are many, and almost none of which are even mentioned by Coyne. In fact, Coyne’s understanding of the creationist position is absolutely pathetic.
- Evolutionists like Coyne much prefer the old creationist arguments; some of which were admittedly poor and often without sufficient warrant. They don't want to know about more recent c. ideas because they are much more substantial and hard to refute or mock.
- Coyne uses old creationist ideas as ideas to mock, though they've long been abandoned by the creationist community, and replaced with new thinking and theories.

Darwinism; Everything is permitted

2011-09-13T12:21:00.000-07:00

With the widespread adoption of evolutionary theory and its eventual triumph in the university, a new 'liberality' was introduced that allowed mere storytelling to proliferate in academia. No longer did one need hard research to get ahead; all one needed was a good story. Doestoevsky might have been thinking of Charles Darwin when he said; if there were no god all was permitted.

Quotes and comments;

1. 'Doestoevsky held that if there were no god all was permitted.' [1.]

- If there is no god then all is not only permitted, but many things are necessary. One of the inventions necessary when men reject the creator is a belief in evolution. People are then permitted to pronounce the most absurd claims of impossible things happening without a word of criticism. If one is an evolutionist all is permitted; even the ludicrous idea (story) that man was once a fish. (The recent book 'Your inner fish' might just as well have been titled 'Your inner algae'.)

i.e. Not only is adultery (porn, abortion, etc.) permitted, but Darwinian fairy stories are permitted as well. Writers are allowed to make absurd claims and receive nothing but accolades for them; e.g. life 'emerged' from non-life (in utter contradiction to what we know about biology).

Once God goes everything goes; not only in the moral realm but in the intellectual realm at all. The examples of this seem to be everywhere; e.g. the various multiverse models; art is whatever you say it is; words don't mean anything; there is no truth; there is no reality; pornography is a force for good; politicians should be able to do whatever they like; etc.

If men reject god they must take on all of God's roles in the universe; e.g. it's not only permitted for men to play god, they must play god. It's not only permitted to invent creation myths, men Must create origin myths. (In the minds of many it's not permitted to critique these new necessary myths.)

If there is no God there is no reality; all we have are billions of different views of what it might or might not be. Who is to say if there is or isn't reality, or what it is. If there is no creator God all cosmological views are permitted. Who is to say whether the pantheist or the polytheist, the materialist or the vitalist is correct? Who is to say we can ever know. All is permitted; not only in pornography, not only in sexual behavior, but in the intellectual and political realm as well. To reject God is to reject any final judge or arbiter; in banal language, it's to lose the referee in the game of life.

Darwin was on of the earliest (not the first by any stretch) to realize that now that Christianity was in decline any idea was permitted, and he made a career out of the implications of this insight. He convinced people that now that Genesis had been thrown out he had the best available substitute. He was permitted to make up wild stories and have them taken seriously.

- M. Johnson

Notes;
1. To be as Gods - R.J. Rushdoony p. 114
2. If man is god then who is there to limit his desires? With billions of people there is literally no end to desires. If there is no god who is to say whose desires are less than another's desires? Who is left to say one desire is better than another?
3. People like Dawkins want to restrict the 'permitted' to the sexual (and perhaps social) realm; but this approach reminds me of the king who stood on the beach in the face of an incoming (flooding) tide, raised his hand and said; ''thus far and no further." (Cosmic evolution for him takes the place of god; and is the 'standard' for what is or is not permitted.) He and his peers will find permission a strong tide to turn back.
4. When I use the term God I'm referring to the Triune God of the Bible.

Darwinism; a Spell check

2011-09-12T09:46:00.001-07:00

Although Daniel Siegel is one of my favorite psychologists, his allegiance to Darwinism sometimes leads him astray. The following quotes come from his discussion of working with a twelve year old girl in therapy.

Quotes and comments;

1. 'The activation of survival reflexes and the emotion of fear push our cortical areas to find danger - sometimes when a threat is truly there, and sometimes when the sense of danger is only our brain's creation. Because this brain system checks for danger I call it the ''checker. The checker has survived over hundreds of millions of years, I said. It was helping [sic] animals long before there were humans, and it takes its job seriously.' [1.]

- This is an example of evolutionary indoctrination at its worst. What chance does a 12 yr old have to defend herself against the spell of such such authoritative pronouncements? The statement is a mess of personification, equivocation and wild speculation. None of it is empirical science. (Need we add that only persons have jobs, and that only persons can take things seriously?)

He tells her, ''these brain circuits have evolved over millions of years to keep us safe.'' (He's ignoring the fact that in textbook theory nothing in evolution happens for a purpose.) He knows nothing of the sort; all he's doing is quoting the latest biology textbook.

One can argue with him even from an materialist perspective; e.g. are these circuits the same now as they were at various points in the past? as they were a million years ago? 500 thousand years ago? five thousand years ago? five hundred years ago? He has no idea, nor does anyone else. (He has no idea if even cosmic evolution is true.) One should not teach children that x is a fact when it is only a hypothesis.

According to Siegel, we're supposed to believe that the 'crowning glory' (p.233) of our prefrontal capacity just happened by accident, but a series of mutations (or copying mistakes); but no one tells us how this would have been possible. The great unanswered question for E. theorists is how one can progress from pond scum to professor by a random series of mistakes - mistakes which amount to the Loss of information. To call Evolution a fact in the face of such a conundrum is without warrant.

All this Darwinian spin adds nothing to what he's doing - it's superfluous and non-scientific. (i.e. non-empirical.) These Darwinian tales are the ghosts of a secular world.

We're to believe that one day there were no humans, just animals, and then one day there Were humans. Okay. Where did all this brand new (exquisitely complex and profound) information come from? Had it been hiding under a rock? Tucked away in some library vault? He's handing his young patient a fantasy, as what he's claiming is impossible. This is not the way the world works and we all know it.

The evolutionary scenario of progressivism is akin to placing a string in your vest pocket and then later pulling it out to find it has a watch attached to it.

In this rather silly interview he tells her that animals without 'checkers' didn't survive while those that had them did. There is of course no evidence such deficient creatures ever existed or ever could exist. This is pure storytelling. The sad part of this Darwinian add on is that it is unnecessary and superfluous. One wishes Siegel (and others) would stick to the empiricial and avoid the metaphysical spin.

3. 'The 'checker' is devoted to our survival - and to passing along our checker genes for another hundred million years...' [3.]

- How Siegel came to write such a wondrous statement I don't know; neither do I know how he managed to attribute devotion to a program of the human brain. (Perhaps it was his devotion to Darwinism.) Devoted means to dedicate oneself to another with a vow. We see here another example of Darwinian smuggling; e.g. personification, equivocation, teleology, prophecy, reification, and speculation are all smuggled into the discussion... and all (supposedly) in the name of science.

Siegel apparently can't decide which evolutionary camp he wants to join; i.e. is the 'checker' interested in us humans or in these so called checker genes? (Ah; evolution; so many theories, and so little time to decide which of them is right :=}

4. 243. '...deep inside the 'checker' just wants to protect you.' [4.]

- This example of equivocation is more like incantation than observation. Only living creatures want things, and only persons want to protect human beings. [4.] It seems Darwinists can't resist the temptation to engage in equivocation and similar fallacies. (The monism of cosmic evolution makes this virtually inevitable. If you ignore the creator/creature distinction you have monism; and if you have monism you have personification and equivocation. Monism makes logical fallacy unavoidable. i.e. if all is one, there can be no differentiation, and logic depends upon differentiation.

- M. Johnson

Notes;
1. Mindsight - Daniel Siegel p. 243
- I realize I can be criticized for overreacting to an evolutionary account that was tailored for a twelve year old's understanding; but I think this is how most children come to believe the veracity of Darwinism. I suspect someone like Siegel can have much more influence than a biology teacher who is being paid to recite textbook orthodoxy. My big complaint it that there's no reason to add the Darwinian speculation to what he's saying. i.e. one doesn't have to speculate on the origins of the brain to discuss how it seems to work.
2. ''
3. Mindsight p.245
4. p.243
- Some animals (e.g. dogs) will 'protect' human beings, but we're dealing here with instincts and bonding not with the human desire to help.
5. One the one hand Siegel has a positive model of psychology to present; but at the same time he teaches that the brain is controlled by circuits that are hundreds of millions of years old and that get us to behave in destructive ways. So his foundation is a pessimisitic one, but he seems to just ignore it and tell us all will be well with a little meditation!
- The way I see it; the fact 'mindsight' can be so effective is evidence the Darwinian speculation he adopts is false.
- If man were what S. claims he is, the techniques he teaches couldn't possibly work. It's impossible for me to imagine these human capacities somehow 'emerged' from some copying mistakes, by random chemical accident. This concept makes no sense to me.
6. While atheists talk about the 'need' to separate science and religion, I'd like to advocate a separation of science and darwinism.
7. Devotion;
-early 13c., from O.Fr. devocion "devotion, piety," from L. devotionem (nom. devotio), noun of action from pp. stem of devovere "dedicate by a vow, sacrifice oneself, promise solemnly," from de- "down, away" (see de-) + vovere "to vow," from votum "vow" (see vow). In ancient Latin, "act of consecrating by a vow," also "loyalty, fealty, allegiance;" in Church Latin, "devotion to God, piety."
8. For fellow fishermen out there; progressive evolution is akin to towing a rope behind a boat and then having the rope turn into a net, complete with corks and leadline and outfitted with a buoy on the end :=}
9. One wonders what evolutionary indoctrination has to do with therapy for OCD. As I've said before; I see E. theory as utterly superfluous to 99.99 percent of science and medicine (let alone anything else). It's no more relevant to life as we live it than a novel by Arthur C. Clarke.

Man is basically good; right?

2011-09-09T12:11:00.000-07:00

Why is it in a culture dominated by secular institutions we still have the media referring to destructive events in the natural world as acts of God? If evolution is a fact, how can anything be an act of God?

Quotes and comments;

1. "To condemn anything in the world of nature as evil is, logically, a heresy for humanism." [1.]

- To say that man is basically good, is in effect saying that nature is basically good. (i.e. since man is a product of nature, for him to be good, nature would have to be good.) Why is it then that we still hear Humanists speaking of natural disasters as acts of god? If they wanted to be consistent they would speak of these floods etc. as acts of nature.

They don't like to do this because this presents us with a nature that is not basically good; and if nature isn't basically good, neither can man himself be basically good. Since the basic tenet of Humanism is that man is basically good, you can see how Humanists shy away from speaking of the acts of nature.

All the arguments atheists use that feature showing how god does (or allows) evil things can be turned around and used against the naturalist position. e.g. parasites, viruses and earthquakes (etc.) don't disprove the existence of a good god, they disprove the existence of a good nature.

If nature isn't basically good then it can't be normative; can't provide a basis for ethics. (e.g. how do you get from mutations and disease to objective moral standards?)

M. Johnson

Notes;
1. To be as God - R.J. Rushdoony p.21
- free book online at Chalcedon.edu
2. Writers like de Sade and Max Stirner declared [above p.22] that no natural act (no act that happens in nature) can be evil or should be outlawed. People like Sam Harris who want to reintroduce ethics into the 'post christian' world are hypocrites who can't accept the obvious conclusions of naturalism. i.e. they want to insist that men are just animals, but they want to have the State force them to act like angels. They can't face the reality of their own position, and so must invent legislation to bind the lizard brained populace with. (Their position is as absurd as that of David Icke :=}

Awake in a dead universe

2011-08-18T11:50:00.000-07:00

If the philosophy of materialism were correct, man would be a personal being living in an impersonal universe.

Quotes and comments;

1. ''The fact man is a person and a personality isolates him from ultimate reality. It leaves him awake in a dead universe..." [1.]

- Secular man sees himself as a person in an impersonal universe. He can't find an explanation for this anomaly, but he's sure that one exists. (Don't all the books on creativity tell the reader to assume that the answer exists, and that all he has to do is discover it?)

The Christian sees himself as a person in a personal universe, and as such is not isolated from ultimate reality. The universe isn't a strange (foreign) place, but a home that was created and crafted with him in mind.

Secular man on the other hand, cannot help but see himself as an alien. (i.e. alienated) Without God life can only seem a very strange (unexplainable) thing. (It would be normal to be a planet or a moon, but not to be a living, breathing, being; and one with a profound consciousness of his situation.)

Is this behind the fascination with aliens? Is the SETI project (etc.) at heart a projection of this feeling of being an alien? Having rejected God man has become alienated from the universe, and seeks a sign that his fear he's all alone isn't true. He seeks a sign that he was correct in his intuition of a godless universe. If aliens are found (other than himself of course) then he feels that the universe won't feel as strange anymore, and his doubts will be quelled.

Secular man is the only alien we know of, and he's projected himself onto (into) the heavens. Looking into the splintered mirror of Humanism he sees himself everywhere. (He wants to find aliens, but he's afraid of them finding him; for he knows that should they exist it will be hard to be the God he now imagines himself to be.)

Notes;
1. Noble Savages - R. J. Rushdoony p. 70. (Available online at Chalcedon.edu; originally titled 'The politics of pornography')
- He's speaking about the modern humanistic worldview.
2. Van Til would deny that this is possible, but if there is no God, man is alone in the universe. At some level he will feel that loneliness, and will feel lonely to the extent he is sure god does not exist. (I doubt if any man is 100 percent sure God does not exist.) Modern man seeks to assuage this loneliness in the pages of SF, but it seems like cold comfort to me. (FTL travel seems as impossible as Darwinism to me.) It's an attempt to shield himself from the cold and to keep himself warm by the storytelling fire.
3. R. speaks of ways modern man tries to escape the alienation of personality; e.g. in pornography. (I think we see in drugs a desire to escape personality.) In the world of porn man becomes a thing or a beast. and escapes the problems and pains of personhood.
4. For Van Til, the belief one lives in a personal universe has an effect on one's consciousness.
5. That secular man feels alienated from the universe can be seen in recent examples of sf novels that feature mankind building not merely new worlds, but new universes. (e.g. Karl Schroeder) Most of these 'universes' are of a micro sort; but still, they're self-contained and independent entities, and especially designed for men to live in. I see this as unspoken (unrealized?) desire for the universe described in Genesis. Because of who he is, and what is nature is, man cannot help but find the picture of a created universe (created as a home) appealing.

Darwinism and musturbation

2011-08-17T11:23:00.000-07:00

Albert Ellis coined the horrid phrase 'musturbation' to refer to the absolutes people impose on life, which then (according to his theory) cause them unneeded misery, but I think it could be better applied to Darwinists and their continual claims that x and y 'must' have been the result of evolution.

Quotes and comments;

1. 'Fish chew by sending their food on an assembly line to the back of the mouth. Mammals chew by positioning food for the teeth. Can evolution explain this difference? Science Daily was sure of it.
''The difference in chewing shows that animals have changed the way they chew and digest their food and that evolution must have played a role.'' [1.]

- The author has no right to say evolution 'must' have played a role. He can't possibly know this. If he wanted to be accurate and honest he would write; ''If we accept evolution as a fact, evolution must have have played a role." ie. his claim is only as true as evolutionary theory; it's not an independent fact, but only a deduction from a system.

I'm tired of evolutionists excusing this kind of fallacy by dismissing it as merely writing in a popular style. If scientists want special respect, then they should they deserve it by writing in a careful, logically valid manner. e.g. a theoretical opinion should never be stated as a fact. (In this case, no one observed the claim that is made; therefore it cannot ever be a fact.)

Why 'must' evolution have played a role? Because we know evolution is true. As usual, evolution is used to to prove evolution.

Notes;
1. Chewing on Evolutionary Stories - Creation/Evolution Headlines July 03
2. One wonders what the author meant when he claimed 'evolution' must have played a role in the difference chewing methods. What exactly is the definition of evolution that he's using? Are we supposed to just guess? The vagueness of the term makes it sorely lacking in content.

The red queen and the arms race

2011-08-10T11:01:00.000-07:00

A brief post on the idea of the evolutionary arms race.

Quotes and comments;

1. 'An interdisciplinary team at the University of Miami got their heads together and appealed to an evolutionary notion called the “Red Queen” hypothesis, and claimed it provides a “Pattern in Escalations in Insurgent and Terrorist Activity” that is neutral regarding the good guys and the bad guys. It resembles, they argue, how pedators and prey evolve in nature. [1.]

- I see no evidence of the 'arms race' that is supposed to be going on. What we really see in most species is stasis. How anyone can hold to the arms race idea in the face of all the evidence for stasis I don't know. If an animal (insect, etc.) doesn't change in tens of millions of years, how can there have been an arms race going on?

The authors are basing their theory on a theory in other words. They're not dealing with the real world, but with textbooks. What passes for science here is a theory based on a myth. (I guess we could call it myth science.) I see no evidence this theory is correct. I see no directional movement in how big or fast animals are. e.g. We see evidence in fossils that animals in the past were generally larger than animals now. I see no compelling evidence they were slower. I see no more than trivial (and temporary) effects of predator on prey or vice versa.

2. ''The authors realized that human armies are much more complex, but chose to omit all the factors involving human intellect, choice and planning, and make their theory completely amoral...'

- They give us an amoral theory of a moral phenomenon. I can't see how that is going to work. Treating human beings like things is the essence of scientism, and there is no reason to think it will ever produce true knowledge. True science does not treat men like machines or like numbers.

Summary;
The alleged arms race is about as real as the Red Queen. Let's call it jabberwocky.

Notes;
1. Can evolutionary theory explain terrorism? Creation/Evolution Headlines July 02

The biggest fish story of them all

2011-08-09T11:26:00.000-07:00

Darwinism is full of tall tales, but the biggest whopper of them all is the idea fish left the oceans and became the first animals, filling a barren earth with animal life forms. We might call it the cosmic fish story.

Quotes and comments;

1. The non-evolution of Coelacanth:
“The fish provided an immediate link to our dim evolutionary past, resembling the lobe-fin fish that were likely the first to leave the water and take to land, ultimately begetting the amphibians, reptiles and mammals we see today, including the human race.” - Matt Walker [1.]

- In my humble opinion, this scenario is the biggest fish story ever told, and one of the biggest reasons I dumped evolution for creation. It's as silly as it is stupid.

How wildly impossible is it?

It's akin to saying birds left the air to become fish :=}
It's akin to saying lions left the Serenghetti for life as crabs on the ocean floor.
It's akin to saying books voluntarily left the library and threw themselves into the flames...
It's akin to a cup of tea turning itself into a cup of coffee. (Perhaps the cream went sour.)
It's akin to a jukebox turning into a potato chip dispensing machine.
It's akin to a salmon turning itself into a bear so it can gorge on blueberries.
It's akin to Hitler turning into a dove and flying off for the hills.
It's akin to a textbook turning into the word of God, utterly devoid of error.
It's akin to a dinosaur turning into a iceberg or a glacier.
It's akin to fire turning into water turning into earth turning into air.
It's akin to college professors all turning in their tenure for life as private tutors or wandering salesmen.
It's akin to all of our politicians suddenly telling nothing but the truth till the end of time.
It's akin to a cloud becoming a dragon, who then becomes a cloud again.
It's akin to a cat turning itself inside out and becoming a dog.

2. 'The narrator [of a video] claimed that the lobed fins “represent the first rudimentary legs which enabled the ancestral amphibians to drag themselves from the water, and begin the colonization of the dry land.” [1.]

- It's interesting that Darwinists like Walker can get fish to drag themselves from the water, while most of us can't manage to drag our teenagers away from the computer :=}

W note the equivocation of speaking of the 'colonization' of the dry land. (At the heart of Darwinism is an equivocation fallacy.)
Perhaps this sin of colonization is the reason these transformed fish later were forced to reenter the ocean. Perhaps it was a ruling from some equivalent of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission.

What caused the fish to drag themselves out of their watery beds for life on dry land?
Was it the promise of credit cards? A house in the suburbs? Cable TV? A McDonald's Happy meal?
Perhaps, as another other mountain climber remarked, the answer was simply, ''because it was there". (I do wonder though, who they used for Sherpa guides.)

Summary;
Did I convince you how silly I think this idea is yet?
It's not actually an idea (or theory) at all, but a necessary deduction from the basic theory. i.e. if the theory is true, this fish story has to be true. This isn't science but rationalist speculation and philosophy.

Q. How can non-creationists believe this? A. They have to.

Posted by; M. Johnson @notentirelyserious.com

Notes;
1.The Evolution of… Come Again? Creation/Evolution Headlines July 01/2011
- Even if the story were true it the C. wouldn't qualify as an 'immediate' link. If there are many quite large steps in between the Coelacanth and man, I see no reason to call it an immediate link.
- This is a sad way to write, as there's no way you should designate something as a fact when it's only speculation. This is a Darwinian story, and should not be presented as a fact. Only things people have directly observed even deserve consideration as facts.
2. At the heart of Darwinism is an equivocation fallacy.
3. The Coelacanth hasn't changed in its entire history, still hasn't learned to walk, and like this story, never will. It's amazing how Darwinists can turn stasis into evolution; it's as remarkable as fish turning into mammals.
Q. What enables all this to happen?
A. The power of story.
Natural selection isn't the driving engine of Evolution, the human imagination is; no miracle is impossible for it to accomplish.

The long, cold stare of stasis; or, all roads lead to Down House

2011-08-08T10:15:00.000-07:00

When you read the popular science press you continually come upon articles that purport to offer more evidence for the veracity of evolutionary theory. The question for today is whether this evidence is discovered or manufactured.

Quotes and comments;

1. "The eyes are more complex than those known from contemporaneous trilobites and are as advanced as those of many living forms. They provide further evidence that the Cambrian explosion involved rapid innovation in fine-scale anatomy as well as gross morphology, and are consistent with the concept that the development of advanced vision helped to drive this great evolutionary event.'' [1.]

- The arthropod eyes being referred to do not provide evidence for rapid evolution of vision capacity. Only if one believes cosmic evolution is a fact, can this be seen as evidence of E. Only if one already accepts e. theory can this be interpreted as evidence for E. This doesn't prove evolution; the theory proves this is evidence! i.e. if you start out with e. you have to end up with evolution, there's no other answer that can arise.

If E. is true, everything is evidence for evolution :=} It's a circular defense of evolution in terms of evolution. i.e. we know this is evidence for evolution. How do we know this? We know this because we know E. is true. If you accept that E. is absolutely, without a doubt, true, no evidence can possibly refute the theory.

2. "Their discovery reveals that some of the earliest animals possessed very powerful vision; similar eyes are found in many living insects, such as robber flies.
Sharp vision must therefore have evolved very rapidly, soon after the first predators appeared during the 'Cambrian Explosion' of life that began around 540 million years ago.'' [1.]

- Why do they say vision 'must' have evolved rapidly? They say this because they know the theory isn't a theory but a fact, and so it can't be wrong. E. could no more be wrong than that it's possible to wake up tomorrow to find gravity had disappeared.

3. "Given the tremendous adaptive advantage conferred by sharp vision for avoiding predators and locating food and shelter, there must have been tremendous evolutionary pressure to elaborate and refine visual organs.'' [1.]

- Evolutionary pressure? What's that? Is it like the pressure of a gas? The pressure of gas after a bad meal? The pressure in a propane tank? Has anyone observed evolutionary pressure? Since we know it was a tremendous pressure I assume this means they were able to measure it :=}
This isn't empirical science, it's just storytelling. There isn't any 'pressure' that produces the mutations that supposedly create all body plans.

We see in examples like this how theory manufactures evidence, and this evidence is then used to support the theory. i.e. it's not the data that produce the so called evidence, but the theory that produces the evidence. When you find a fossil (etc.) you don't observe evidence, you observe some data. No one has ever seen evidence; as evidence is manufactured by a rational process.

The whole concept of evidence is non-empirical. Evidence is a philosophical concept in origin; and is based on the assumption truth exists, and that one can find support for propositions. (esp. via observation) For evidence to exist, one must have a theory of truth to base your claims; for if there is no truth, there can be no evidence. (It was Van Til's position that there is no autonomous method for truth, and he spoke of the necessity of scripture.)

This is the dangerous position the evolutionist is in. By claiming E. is a certain fact, as certain as anything knowledge possessed by humankind, they have made it impossible to refute, and all contra evidence (such as this is in my view) is interpreted in a way friendly to the theory, or if this seems impossible, it's just ignored.

Let's say the theory is false; this means that the people who accept it unconditionally would never be able to refute the theory.... as all the data must be interpreted in such a way as to provide more evidence the theory is correct. By claiming it to be not a theory but a fact they've placed themselves in a prison of their own making. To claim a theory is a fact is imprison critical thought.

By insisting E. isn't a theory but a fact, the Darwinist protects himself from self doubt and from non-evolutionary critique. If E. is a certain fact he need not concern himself with critiques of E. theory, and can just brush them aside with a wave of his hand. By claiming he can tell us what the true nature of reality is, man has usurped the role of God, for to claim that x is a fact is to claim omniscience. (Apparently an omniscient God is impossible, but an omniscient human being isn't :=}

As I've said before, finite, fallible, and fallen man is incapable of determining facts, and if he's wise he will resist the temptation to do so. It was Van Til's opinion that the only facts (truth) man has access to come from the special revelation we call the Bible.

M. Johnson [frfarer at gmail.com]

Notes;
1. Complex Arthropod Eyes Found in Early Cambrian; Creation/Evolution Headlines June 29
2. 'A side-by-side comparison of the fossil imprint with a living insect eye shows virtually no difference in complexity.'
- As is usual, no evolutionary progress is seen in the history of an animal kind; the animal appears out of nowhere, and remains almost identical to end of its years on earth. This looks like a refutation of the theory to me, but then no one is paying me to defend Darwinism.
3. 'In their concluding paragraph, they affirmed use of the phrase “Cambrian explosion” as a real event. They could offer no explanation for the evolution of these eyes, nor did they put forward any transitional forms.
- If there really was a 'Cambrian explosion' then what gets exploded is the myth of Darwinism, for this is not what he assumed and predicted, nor what he thought he had proved with his armchair speculations. Since Darwinists know E. is true, this can't be the case however, and feel they've got nothing to worry about :=}
4. I'm referring to Cornelius Van Til
5. Why we need to prove evolution if it's already a fact is a matter for another day.

Using a story for a bridge

2011-08-05T11:59:00.000-07:00

The chasm between man and chimp continues to trouble evolutionary theorists.

Quotes and comments;

1. 'Mosley quoted John Shea, professor of palaeoanthropology at Stony Brook University in New York, making a remark that casts doubt on the whole evolutionary story: “There's such a huge gulf between ourselves and our nearest primate relatives, gorillas, chimpanzees and bonobos,” he said, putting his faith in a big IF: “If that gap were populated by other hominids, we’d see that gap as not so much a gulf but rather a continuum with steps on the way.” [1.]

- That evolutionists keep trying to account for the 'gulf' (chasm) between man and chimp shows me that this is a problem they find disturbing, one that causes doubts in the theory itself. For the theory to have any credibility, evolutionists will have to come up with a plausible story that can bridge the miles wide gap between man and ape.

The Christian who accepts the Genesis account doesn't believe this gap will ever be filled, and that the only 'bridge' across it will forever be a story. The materialist stares at all the evidence he could need for rejecting Darwinism, but he turns his back on it. He prefers having no answer to accepting the biblical account of creation.

The greatest mistake our thinkers have made is to call man an animal; this is the source of endless errors in science, culture, theology and about every important subject there is. The uniqueness of man is obvious, but Darwinists won't admit it, as their theory won't allow uniqueness.
Calling man an animal isn't observational science, as man's uniqueness is what we observe not his identity. It's comical that people make this claim in the face of the evidence against it; you'd be closer to the mark if you insisted a sparrow was a fish.

It's clear to me that human beings and animals do not belong in the same category.

M. Johnson

Notes;
1. Avoid Confusion: Disbelieve Paleoanthropologists; Creation/Evolution Headlines
June 28/2011
1. 'Mosley quoted John Shea, professor of palaeoanthropology at Stony Brook University in New York, making a remark that casts doubt on the whole evolutionary story: “There's such a huge gulf between ourselves and our nearest primate relatives, gorillas, chimpanzees and bonobos,” he said, putting his faith in a big IF: “If that gap were populated by other hominids, we’d see that gap as not so much a gulf but rather a continuum with steps on the way.”
Too bad all the species of Homo that Mosley discussed in his article appear just as equidistant from chimpanzees as the rest of us.'
3. Evolutionists have been unwilling to abandon the chain of being idea; that there are small steps all the way from the supposed first cell to man himself. Shea just assumes that such gradation existed among the human races that once (supposedly) existed. The Christian who accepts Genesis, denies that such races existed, and affirms that there has never been more than one human race.
4. '...a commentary in PNAS, Bernard Wood wrote, “The origin of our own genus remains frustratingly unclear.”
- That paleoanthropologists can't figure out the origin of the human species is good evidence you would think that the model they're using is wrong. Apparently it's taboo however to question the Darwinian model.
All we get from these people is hype and wild stories; stories that are endlessly changing. (Trying to pin these guys down to anything is like trying to pin down the location of an electron.)
The science content approaches zero.

Darwinism as equivocation

2011-07-27T11:11:00.000-07:00

Darwinism at times seems like one long (and fallacious) equivocation of man and animal.

Quotes and comments;

1. ''Although altruistic behavior is well-documented in other primates, the range of altruistic behaviors in other primate species, including the great apes, is much more limited than it is in humans.'' [1.]

- The authors are engaging in equivocation; one of the most frequent intellectual sins engaged in by Darwinists. You cannot compare the 'altruism' (i.e. instincts) of apes with the altruism of human beings. This makes no sense; and is grossly misleading. This is akin to imagining the fall of an apple and the fall of the stock market can be explained the same way.
Darwinism encourages (if not makes necessary) the constant use of equivocation. This has been one of the worst fallouts from the triumph of Darwinism on campus.)

2. “This suggests that there may be fundamental differences in the social preferences that motivate altruism across the primate order, and there is currently considerable interest in how we came to be such unusual apes.”

- The authors are staring at evidence that refutes Darwinism and they apparently can't see it, can't even imagine doubting it. It's extraordinary.

It apparently never occurs to them (even as a possibility) that humans are Not apes; not even 'unusual' apes. (Just what does 'unusual' ape mean? Does it mean something other than non-ape? How unusual does this 'ape' need to be to qualify as non-ape?
How would an evolutionist know how to answer this question? Do any of them even ask it? (If so they're keeping pretty quiet about it.)

3. “Differences in performance across species and differences in performance across tasks are not yet fully understood and raise new questions for further study,” they concluded.

- Why do the authors insert the words 'not yet' into their sentence? The sentence should simply read; ''...differences are not understood....''
I see no reason to believe the Darwinian model will ever explain the chasm that exists between animals and the human. If they haven't done it by now, why should we think they ever will? It's only a faith in Materialism that leads people to imagine they will 'solve' this problem. (There isn't any problem here from a creation perspective. It's only a problem that needs to be solved if you reject biblical creation.)

M. Johnson

Notes;
1. If This Is Evolution, What Is Trivia? Creation/Evolution Headlines June 24
Nice Humans; [quoting from below]
2. Silk and House;
http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2011/06/16/1100305108.short
3. Synonyms for unusual; Uncommon, unwonted, singular, remarkable, odd, peculiar, supernormal, abnormal...
4. Isn't it unusual to call such disparate entities (or behaviors) by the same name? Isn't this considered poor method?
5. Altruism;
A. Unselfish concern for the welfare of others; selflessness.
- One problem with the authors use of altruism, is that apes don't have a self in the sense humans do. e.g. they presumably don't even know they're going to die (know their lineage, etc.)
- I would suggest that only a creature capable of symbolic language would be capable of true altruism, as it requires ideas about justice, society, etc.
B. 'A term first employed by the French philosopher Comte to denote the benevolent instincts and emotions in general, or action prompted by them: the opposite of egoism.
- Animals don't distinguish their impulses from their true (or ideal) selves, but 'identify' fully with them.
6. While our authors admit some problems, Eugenie Scott insists there are no problems with Darwinism at all.

A time for miracles

2011-06-14T15:11:00.000-07:00

If George Wald can get away with referring to time as a hero, I hope I can get away with playing with the metaphor a little. Let's take a not entirely serious look at time as hero. Yes; it's another episode of the Grammarian detective.

Quotes and comments;

1. 'Time is in fact the hero of the plot. The time with which we have to deal is of the order of two billion years. Given so much time, the "impossible" becomes possible, the possible probable, and the probable virtually certain. One has only to wait: time itself performs the miracles. [1.]

- In saying 'time is the hero' Wald admitted, despite himself, that the 'miracle of life' required intelligence and personhood (i.e. to turn inert matter into a living organism) Only human beings (persons) are heroes, neither inanimate matter or time can qualify. I think we can safely say that there are no heroes on a dead world.

Why might he have let the word hero slip? Was he thinking of Prometheus (I notice that atheists still love some myths.) If he was, that doesn't fit, because there were people around when Prometheus supposedly did his thing, there would have been no people around when our hero time brought life into being.

So why say hero? There were no bad guys to slay, no wrongs to right. Wasn't he admitting that it would take the miraculous; i.e. something myth-like for this to happen?
Isn't hero just another word for god when used in this fashion?

Time can't do anything of course; expecting time to accomplish anything is like digging a well with the idea of a shovel, or escaping from a jail cell with the idea of a hacksaw.
As I see it, time is just what we mean by motion; without motion there's no time. So; can motion accomplish miracles? Not that I've heard of.

Where does the word hero come from? It comes from mythology.
To say time is the hero is to bring mythology into the picture; it amounts to saying we need a mythological answer to our problem. (You no doubt remember that Plato would enlist myths to resolve unanswerable problems in cosmology or metaphysics... so this kind of thing has a long history.)

In mythology the hero is often (if not usually) of divine parentage or origin. To say 'time is the hero' is to say the answer must almost certainly be of divine origin. The hero often possesses divine gifts (supernatural gifts). We can see the fit, as it would almost certainly require divine gifts of some kind to turn a rock into a living organism, and then turn that proto-cell into a human being (i.e. a creature capable of inventing heroes; turning mere paper into a living
creature.)

A hero is usually someone favored by the gods. This allows him to pull off some of the superhuman stunts he becomes famous for. You can see why (in our scenario) he might need some divine favor. He didn't merely have to slay a dragon, he had to create one.

Heroes are known for risking their lives. I'm not sure this fits here, as there was no life. Can you risk your life when you're not alive?
I don't know of anyone who thinks time is alive. They might think time is a hero but I don't know of anyone who thinks time is alive. (What time would look like in this plot I don't know. Would it have a cape? I'm not sure.

I've looked hero up in the dictionary, but I don't see time listed as a representative. Funny. Is it possible Wald was wrong?

Heroes are known for their great strength, so perhaps it was the strength possessed by Time that did the trick. Perhaps it squeezed the life out of a stone or something.

A few heroes are known for their intellectual prowess, but I don't think Time qualifies.

Hero;
1. 'A real or mythical person of great bravery who carries out extraordinary deeds.
- the question we need to ask is this; was time a real hero or a mythical one? (Answer carefully; the fate of science may depend on your answer.)

Turning inert matter into a living organism (whether once or several times the oracles do not say) certainly qualifies as an extraordinary event. It was certainly out of the ordinary; as inert matter rarely comes together to create life forms.

A hero is sometimes a protaganist in a work of fiction. Yes; that might work... but where is the contest, and what is it about? In a dead world what is there to contend about? There won't be maidens for a long time to come. Who are there to contend over the maiden who isn't there?

The hero is sometimes the leader of a cause, but it's hard to see Time in this light isn't it? Why would life be a cause in a dead world? Who would there be to fight for this cause, and why would they enlist?

In modern terms we might refer to Time as the leading actor in a drama. We have to admit that since Gamow knighted Time as the great hero, it certainly has gained a lot of honors, and gained a lot of added power as well.

A hero is sometimes a mere mortal who gets raised to godhood after death. It's certainly true that Time has only recently been granted godhood, and given the power to accomplish miracles, and it's true that Time now sits with the gods on Olympus... but of course Time never was alive, so I don't know if this fits.

Summary;
Without an almost endless amount of time, evolution becomes an obvious miracle; but a miracle with no one to perform it.

In the words of someone more eloquent than myself;
'An important aspect of the standard evolutionary geological time table is the urgent necessity for countless millions of years to dilute the miracles of evolution and make them seem 'natural.' It is assumed that changes that are impossible or else miraculous when pinpointed in time can be rendered plausible and natural when blanketed with millions of years.' [2.]

Mike Johnson

Notes;
1. 'Time is in fact the hero of the plot. The time with which we have to deal is of the order of two billion years. What we regard as impossible on the basis of human experience is meaningless here. Given so much time, the "impossible" becomes possible, the possible probable, and the probable virtually certain. One has only to wait: time itself performs the miracles.
2. The mythology of science - R.J. Rushdoony p.52
'An important aspect of the standard evolutionary geological time table is the urgent necessity for countless millions of years to dilute the miracles of evolution and make them seem 'natural.' It is assumed that changes that are impossible or else miraculous when pinpointed in time can be rendered plausible and natural when blanketed with millions of years.'
- This book (a brief review of evolutionary science circa 1965) is available online, and is well worth reading; especially for a comparison with the current scene. [Chalcedon]

- Rushdoony points out that if the supposed events of evolution took place over a short period of time (e.g. 6000 years, or even 60,000) they would have to be called miracles. For some reason people believe or accept the idea that if these miracles happen over millions of years they're not miracles. We're supposed to believe that 'time' makes all these miracles possible.

So what is this miracle maker time? Isn't it an immaterial force? Isn't it a mere abstraction? Is there such a 'thing' as time? Can time DO anything? Not that I can see. As far as I can see, time is just a name given to entropy. I think people confuse time with motion.
Let's be agreeable and assume time = motion. How can motion accomplish miracles? How motion can create life from non-life?

If you want a true picture of evolution, imagine a picture of a rock turning into a human being, all with no outside help. That's the kind of miracle we're talking about. (i.e. imagine it as an animated film)

All atheists know God, even Isaac Asimov

2011-06-13T15:25:00.000-07:00

A distinctive of the apologetic developed by Cornelius Van Til was his insistence that all men know God, and that since they do, it's a mistake to try and prove his existence to them.

Quotes and comments;
1. "It will not do to say that the natural man knows nothing of God...'' [1.]

- How can Van Til say the atheist knows God, if the atheist denies that he does? Isn't this being unfair? I don't think so. Let's look at an example that I think is illuminating.

Isaac Asimov was the media's favorite atheist before a certain Brit came along, and he was not shy about claiming that God didn't exist. On one occasion I heard (or read) him say, that he was aware that to say God didn't exist was to affirm a universal negative, and that this was a logical fallacy. However, he added, he believed the evidence was so overwhelmingly in favor of god's non-existence, that he felt he was justified in his claim God did not exist.

I think we see here a case of a man saying x while he knows it's inaccurate to do so. i.e. he knows he can't prove God doesn't exist, but yet he says it anyway. He knows God at least in the sense he knows he can't disprove his existence. (I would claim he knows a lot more about God than this seemingly minor point.)

Asimov was one of the best educated minds of his time (especially in science), this means that he of all men, had the smallest excuse for rejecting God.

Asimov might have asked himself why it was that logic didn't allow him to deny the possibility of God's existence, or why it seemed (as it were) to defend God.
He might have asked how logic came to be? i.e. if all were matter in motion, what was logic?
He might have asked how it was the chemical reactions in his brain were capable of logic, or how they knew about logic, or why they trusted in logic.
He might have asked how, if only the physical can exist, logic can exist, or what exactly it is.
He might have asked how it is that the universe seems rational. He might have asked why matter cares about logic (which in terms of materialism can only be matter itself).

Van Til emphasizes the point that it is wrong to say that the natural man does not know God. It is impossible for any man not to know God; although it might be possible for him to be unaware of this (at least in full detail), or unaware of how much he knows of God. The atheist no doubt wants some evidence for this and we'll offer some.

Since the universe was created by God, to know the universe is to know God. e.g. if I read a novel by someone I don't know, who even lives half way around the planet, when I finish it I'll know something of its author, even if I don't consciously think of this knowledge.
To see a painting is to know something of the person who painted it. To listen to a piece of music is to learn something of its composer. To know a child is to know something of his parents.

To the extent man is familiar with his own nature he knows God. e.g. by knowing the contents (and workings) of his conscience man knows something of God, of the God who made him, and who originally formed his conscience.
To know his abilities and capacities (e.g. his intelligence, his capacity for creativity) man knows something of God. To realize the extent of the universe is to learn something about God.
Even the atheist who insists he knows nothing of God, who claims He does not even exist, knows a great deal about God. Men know a lot more about God than they realize.

All languages have their origin in the language God shared with Adam, so there's a sense in which to know language is to know God.
Since we think (largely at least) in and with language, to think is to know God. The basic assumptions of language depend upon a Creator for their veracity and validity, and these assumptions give man knowledge of God. (e.g. that reality exists, that truth exists, that separate minds exist, that words mean something, etc.)
The natural man ought to ask himself, what would need to be true for these assumptions to be valid.

This is true even on a banal level. If you were to live in a stranger's house you would learn something about them, even if they weren't there.
All men know God, but many deny that God exists, because they don't want to admit that they know.

The Bible tells us that the universe is full of God's glory; this being the case man cannot but know God.
Man lives within the sphere of God's influence. His presence is inescapable; and since man was created with an ability to know God, he cannot escape being aware of evidence for God. ("For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him.'' - Roman 1:21) [5.]

Notes;
1. "It will not do to say that the natural man knows nothing of God...'' - Van Til's Apologetic - Greg Bahnsen p.631
2. This indirect knowledge of God (and there's far more than I mentioned) adds up since God is a unified and unconflicted being. This means that the various things we know about God don't conflict with each other.
3. Van Til claimed that man not only knew God, he knew God's character as well.
4. If atheists would turn their critical powers (which can't be explained by matter in motion in my opinion) upon the idea of materialism they might be shocked to see how inadequate it is. They rarely do this however, and enjoy shooting arrows at Christianity much more. The atheist is like the man scared to look at himself in the mirror. (He'd rather write as if that face wasn't there, and wasn't looking at him.) I see a tendency that the more doubts a person has about their own worldview, the more intent they become on looking critically at other worldviews. This animus towards other worldviews can be a defense against doubt.
5. "...because that, knowing God, they glorified him not as God, neither gave thanks; but became vain in their reasonings, and their senseless heart was darkened.'' - ASV
6. I might add that although Asimov was presumably named for him, he had a very negative view of the story of Abraham and Isaac. For him this story illustrated all that he didn't like about religion. The point that seemed to escape him was that in terms of materialism his animus against God and against religion made no sense. i.e. if all is matter in motion then moral standards are a delusion.
7. I remember as a teenager that each month I would eagerly read the new column by Asimov, that was published in 'Fantasy and Science Fiction'. (I guess you could say I learned my atheism from the best of them. It was only men years later that I abandoned materialism for creation... and only years later that I developed any interest in Christianity.)
- I don't want to give the wrong impression here; as I remember it, most of the columns concerned astronomy. (It is true however, that Asimov had a strong dislike for any kind of creationism, as he called it. He saw this as a product of the radical 'sects' of Christianity. i.e. believers in Genesis.)

Science; a short history of worldview conquest

2011-06-09T15:31:00.000-07:00

Despite talking of the need for separation of church and state, materialists have long had as their goal the control of all things. They've managed their conquest by using science and scientists to oust all comers. They have achieved a near total control over the seats of power; political, social, academic, educational and all else.

Quotes and comments;
1. Summarizing the atheist or materialist view, Rushdoony says;
'... because God is a myth, the evolutionary and empirical approach to man's problems must be scientific; i.e. experimental, and man is thus the prime laboratory test animal.' [1.]

- A worldview has three basic components; metaphysics, epistemology and ethics. Materialists (in the name of science) now have control over all three. By banning creation and doubts about Darwin from the classroom they've taken over metaphysics. By claiming that real knowledge only comes from science, and by getting judges to define terms, they've taken over epistemology. By enforcing the politically correct agenda they've taken over, and are taking over, ethics.

I'll remind you that when the State takes over ethics it enforces its 'ideas' with all the power at its command. (So much for the humble interests of science.) A scientific ethic is an enforced ethic.

According to materialists this worldview conquest was necessary because once men discovered that there was no God, a firm foundation for philosophy (and society) had to be found. Thankfully 'science' was ready to rush in and fill the void.

It didn't start this way of course; in its early days science was a humble affair not at all interested in global conquest. It's been quite a ride.
The first thing scientists did was to call themselves scientists. The philosophers could keep the wisdom niche, what they were interested in was knowledge; and as Bacon had said, knowledge is power.
They spurned supposed wisdom for practical power; and sought the knowledge that could be turned into power. (Power that could be used to get the elite what they wanted.)

The early scientists allayed fears by the clergy that they were going to intrude into their realm, by telling them they had no interest in questions of value; that all they were interested in was the phenomenal realm; they weren't interested in metaphysics, epistemology or ethics.... if they wanted, the clergy could have these to themselves, or share them with the philosophers.

Such were the early days of science. It didn't last long however, and science (like the British empire) began to expand its borders, taking on more and more of the world's intellectual work. In the end there was nothing they didn't claim to own; from metaphysics to ethics and all else besides.

The conquest has been illegitimate; as scientists are simply not competent to judge in these realms. Having a lab coat doesn't mean you have any special insight into philosophy. Having a brood of rats under your control doesn't mean you have special access to moral knowledge.

Of special concern is the latest foray taken by scientists, and that is its invasion of the realm of ethics. We hear more and more about science being able to determine a moral code, and even moral absolutes. (e.g. S. Harris)
The fact you can't go from what is to what ought to be, doesn't bother these people as they're not interested in truth, but in imposing their own moral code on the populace. Oh they'll pretend their ideas are objective, the discoveries of science, but they'll be nothing of the kind.

The great danger with handing ethics over to the lab coats is that when they hand in their supposed findings, they will demand the government implement them. If the politicians are hesitant to do so they will be branded as anti-science.
Watching the behavior of a rat tells you no more about human ethics than the color of its coat does.
A 'scientific' ethics is about as meaningful as scientific economics, scientific poetry, or scientific art. It's based on the reductionism that says matter is all there is.

Under the influence of materialism, science has become totalitarian, and this has led to the creation of a totalitarian state. There is nothing scientists don't want to take over, and there is nothing the state doesn't want to take over. The two go hand in hand. Each time a bureaucrat wants to defend a gov. policy they use scientists as their authorities; and scientists are more than happy to help out. "It's all based on good science,'' they chirp.

Science is now seen as control; not a search for truth but a search for power. Scientists are almost always control freaks; why else would they conduct experiments that demand complete power on the behalf of the scientist, and utter helplessness of the entities being experimented on? (Are there exceptions? Sure; but they have no power within the science community.)

Scientists have betrayed the humble beginnings of science, and its focus on the physical world, and the realm of the phenomenal. Charles Darwin was one of the major factors in leading science away from an empirical stance, and toward rampant speculation and intellectual megalomania. (Compare him to a Michael Faraday or a James Clerk-Maxwell if you want to get an idea of what happened.)

Darwin was happy to pontificate on any subject under the sun, most of it from under the safety of his sun bonnet. He replaced observation with story; he replaced measurement with speculation and spin. He turned science from empiricism to interpretation; and once that was achieved world conquest was under way.
"It's not hard to imagine...'' was the flavor of the new science, and has been ever since. (e.g. "It's quite likely there are an infinite number of universes...")

What we see in the imperialist science of today are stories taking the place of observation and measurement. There's no real evidence to back up the 'research' that supposedly led to the politically correct ethic of today; it's just a collection of stories and interpretation. (Yes folks; it's the new science of deconstruction; where anything goes, the more extreme the better.)

The idea all that exists is matter isn't an observation of science, but a claim of materialists. It's not science, it's philosophy. Here as elsewhere the materialist claims he's doing science, when his actions are just a smokescreen to hide the smuggling in of philosophical views.

The idea that the only real (true) knowledge comes from science isn't scientific but philosophical. (It also happens to be false)
The claim refutes itself. e.g. if there is no truth in language, the claim science is the only road to knowledge isn't true. As usual the materialist conflates two entirely different realms; the knowledge of the physical realm is not like knowledge in the human realm (psychological, ethical,etc.) at all, and the idea you can use the same method in both is unsupported by anything but bias.

So here we sit and stew; the materialists have won, and it will do no good to deny it. They've managed to persuade the powers that be that matter is all there is, that science is the only road to knowledge, and that only scientists can determine moral truth.
The great irony is that materialism gives no foundation for any of this. If all was merely matter in motion nothing could be known and there would be no one to know it.

The victory is nearly complete, and the scientists will soon hand the baton to the State bureaucrats. It's all a ruse, but how we'll stop the wheel from spinning, and from grinding us all under, I don't know.

Mike Johnson

Notes;
1. The Mythology of science - R.J. Rushdoony p.28
- available online at the Chalcedon website.
Many of Rushdoony's books are available for reading online. (He was/is one of my favorite writers.)
- I would like to be a postmillenialist, but I'm afraid I don't have it in me.

Science? or the sciences?

2011-06-08T15:41:00.000-07:00

The first science was epistemology, and it's still the foundation of all the sciences. The fact that we have scientists (plural) means, necessarily, that we have sciences (plural). Only if there were but one scientist on earth could there be such a thing as science (singular).

Quotes and comments;

1. 'The main goal of modern science is to have the knowledge required for prediction, planning and control.' [1.]

- Is there some monolith called science? Is there only one model of science? Should we refer to science or to the sciences? These are some of the questions I want to look at in this post.

Modern science is heavily financed by the State because the political elite want to find out how to achieve total control over the populace. They want to know how best to implement their plans. They want to know how to predict how the masses will respond to any new program. They want to be able to control any negative response by the public to what the elite do. They want scientists to tell them how they can achieve a complete mastery over the rabble; how they can micro-manage every aspect of their lives.

Given all this does anyone wonder why the average person might fear science. (It's not science he should fear, but scientists; and the knowledge scientists pass on to the elite.) There's a steady drumbeat in the press about an irrational fear of science, and its noteworthy that this is the way any opposition to particular programs is described.

e.g. we read something like ''people have no reason to fear science,'' never something like ''People have no reason to fear scientists." The first is hard to refute, while the second is easy to refute; all you have to do is give some examples. Science is presented as infallible; when we know scientists are not. Science is presented as wholly good; while we know scientists are not. Science is presented as harmless, while we know scientists are not.

The talk is always of science, and rarely ever of scientists. Science can then be idealized, glamorized, celebrated, defended, etc. - while this is so much harder to do with real human beings. (e.g. the ones who devote themselves to creating weapons and surveillance techniques, etc.)

The public is told in daily editorials that 'science' can answer all questions. The fact is the average scientist can't even tell you if he loves his wife or his kids. We all know scientists can't answer all questions; anyone whose talked to a few of them knows that. Science is built up into a god-like figure who transcends mere mortals. (Clearly a god made in man's own image.)
This pomposity reminds me of Genesis, and the claim that if Eve ate of the forbidden fruit, "ye shall be as gods....'' I think that what the Serpent meant by this cryptic statement was that ''ye shall be able to answer all questions for yourself."

The myth of science is that there is only one answer to every question, and that this answer must be naturalistic, explaining things solely in terms of matter in motion. i.e. there is no other way of looking at things; if an answer does not conform to Materialist orthodoxy it is simply, undeniably false.

e.g. you aren't allowed (if you want to wear the noble name of science) to say something like, ''well, in terms of the creationist model...." or ''in terms of the theistic model'' or ''in terms of the Buddhist model,'' this kind of qualification is ruled out. One doesn't even talk in terms of the materialist model, one just assumes that the materialist model is correct. e.g. one doesn't say ''in terms of the materialist model x is correct'' but instead one says ''x is correct''.

One isn't even supposed to say something like, ''as far as we know x is correct'' or ''provisionally speaking x is correct'' or ''until proven false we believe x is correct''. This kind of context and qualification is considered giving in to the creationists. The scientist is presented as someone who possesses certain knowledge; absolute knowledge. If you come to his office he can open a drawer and take out a fact to present you with.... and only he can do this. In this glorified model of science the scientist deals in objective truth, while everyone else does not.

Part of the plan to control men is to get them to accept this idealized (idolized?) model of science, to accept the vision of science as an infallible god. This god will then be presented as the source of everything the elite want the public to believe. When editorialists scold the public, and tell them they must accept what all government approved scientists say, they're in effect saying the public must accept what the elite say. As long as the elite hold the purse strings, the scientists will do their bidding, and act as their mouthpiece.

One way for people to protect themselves from this agenda is to speak in terms of sciences, not science; to speak of scientists and not science; to speak of science as a verb and not an noun, and to speak of theories instead of facts. It may not seem much, but it's better than nothing, and might be more effective than people think.

Notes;
1. The mythology of science - R.J. Rushdoony p.6
- the book can be read online at Chalcedon.edu (The book was originally published in the 1960s as I remember, but is still valuable.
2. You notice that it makes little sense to refer to a fear of the sciences. (I don't recall ever seeing the phrase.) This tells me that sciences is preferable to science.

Notes on language; the deadly effects of Darwinian grammar

2011-05-31T11:16:00.000-07:00

In this post I want to make some comments on the effect of Darwinism on language. I'll use an article from the current issue of 'Discover' magazine as an example.

Quotes and comments;

1. 'Instinct tells us that sharks are more deadly than delicious fatty foods. Instinct is wrong.' [1.]

- The problem with this claim is the use of the word 'deadly' for both these dangers. E.s seem to delight in abusing language, in endless conflation. A shark is a positive threat, a living organism, a predator that attacks; to put it simply, fat is not. Fat is not an active living entity for one thing. We willingly ingest fat; it does not ingest us. [2.]

Instinct is wrong? Instinct can never be wrong from an evolutionary point of view; instincts just are, they're not right or wrong. There is no right or wrong in evolution. (I wish evolutionists would take their own theory seriously; and stop pretending it is what it is not.) Saying instinct is wrong amounts to saying evolution is progressive, and you know where it's going, and how. Wrong is a theistic concept, and is meaningless apart from it.

We can by this example see how desperate science types are to trash 'traditional' views... to pretend only 'science' can give real answers to questions.

If I like fatty foods and ingest them, they do not consist of a danger; they're a 'risk' I've decided to accept for the sake of pleasure. You cannot call that a 'deadly' danger.

Sharks want to kill, fats do not (they don't want anything).

I get tired of this endless abuse of language in our sci mags. (Are vagueness, imprecision, conflation, obfuscation considered good method these days?)

Fats may kill but they don't lead you left bleeding and torn in the water; they don't deprive you of vitality and effectiveness in your life the way missing an arm or a head might. i.e. the effects are utterly different. (We need fats, although certain kinds of processed fats can be harmful. i.e. it's not the 'instinct' that leads us astray, but the modern food processing industry... you would think this would be an important caveat.)

They ignore the fact different things are dangerous at different times; e.g. we don't fear fats when out for a swim in the ocean, or fear sharks when eating a hamburger. (at least few of us do.)

Fatty foods are not deadly; the fact some (processed ones) can be deadly does not give anyone a warrant for conflating fat and deathly risk. Claiming the fatty foods are deadly amounts to saying x = y; where x is fat and y is deadly, and this is just false. i.e. fatty foods are more than just deadly (if in fact they are; we need to remind readers that much of the modern campaign to vilify fats stems from a belief vegetarianism is a righteous lifestyle and eating meat is evil).
They are delicious, necessary, comforting, healthy, and at times the only available choice, etc. ie. you cannot say F = D; as F includes more than D. (To vilify fatty foods is to hold liberty cheap; something only people with liberty do.)

We see here the desire of the educated to look down on the masses; to imagine the latest findings in Nature = God's own truth. The authors are laughing at the poor deluded masses. (Maybe we should put them on a fat-free diet to atone for their sins, and see how they do.)

You can't equate a death occasioned by great terror, with a death of contented debauchery. You can't equate all dangers; this makes no sense. (Is it good method to claim x, y, and z are all the same thing?)

For better or worse we face many different dangers; some come from without and some come from our own hand. To say fats are deadly is like saying sharks and alcohol are both deadly entities; ignoring the fact one has a mission to see you as a piece of meat and the other is self inflicted. (Is this kind of confusion good method?)

The shark has an aim and an intent while fat does not.

A shark attack is a hundred percent negative, while eating fatty foods is not. (Without fats in our diet our brains would atrophy and implode; no fat = no brain.)

A shark has been designed (in part) as a killing machine; it is what it is becausse of its status as predator.

We can't conflate all fats; there is nothing 'deadly' about natural fats. eg. is salmon deadly? (Is it good method to ignore important distinctions?)

Sharks are hostile, fats are not. (We'll not mention the fact sharks have fat in them, as we don't want to confuse readers who've been victimized by the bad writing of sci mags. Yes; in this sense, fats can be deadly :=}

You can't conflate dying over decades with dying in minutes. (Is it good method to ignore time factors?) I don't think many people would be terrified of shark attacks if they resulted in death over 3-5 decades.

This isn't science; it's PC goofiness. (We used to have the Left wing, and the right wing; now we need a new wing for the politically correct crowd. The PC wing I guess.)

You can see the obvious motivations behind this silly claim. What we see is an attempt to derive morals from science; the attempt to bridge the gap between description and prescription; something that David Hume insisted could not be done. The unstated message is clear (and I find it sad that so much science is now written up as secular sermon) ''don't eat meat; save the planet by becoming a vegetarian."

This attitude reminds me of something taken from Star Trek; the next generation... where humans no longer 'enslave' animals for the purpose of eating them. (In slave we have more conflation, as the same term is used for animals and humans; where it's only applicable for humans.)

You'd have better luck trying to persuade sharks to quit eating meat, than you would at persuading human beings to stop eating fatty foods. Christianity tells us that men have been given the freedom (by God) to eat what they will in the post incarnation era. Each person must decide for themselves what is best, what best conforms to their conscience. We have no right to ever violate God's will for our lives (revealed through his laws and commandments) but we do have the right to eat meat and fatty foods. They are not deadly; what is deadly is sin.

Summary;
- Behind the Darwinian misuse of language lies a monistic model of reality; the idea that all things (being merely matter in motion) are essentially one, and are connected in a chain of being from a common ancestry. (That this is speculative vision imposed on reality will become clear in the years to come, if I'm any good at guessing, as even with the evolutionary camp people are beginning to question and even reject the common ancestor idea.)
This is the rationale (conscious or unconscious) for using the same terms for both animals and humans (for all things in fact). e.g. animal behavior described in moral terms, the conflation of animal 'tool making' and human tool making, the 'language' of animals and humans, and so on. This abuse has become rampant, and constitutes a danger to any traditional notion of civilization.

- Mike Johnson

Notes;
1. Discover; July/August 2011
What You Don't Know Can Kill You
'Instinct tells us that sharks are more deadly than delicious fatty foods. Instinct is wrong. Risk analysts take on evolution.'
2. Why is fat delicious if it's a negative thing? The materialist has to explain this in evolutionary terms.
3. Man before the Fall was a vegetarian, and only after the Fall became a meat eater. During the era of Israel, there were strict dietary laws. After Christ men were given the right to eat as they thought best. In heaven? I don't know. It may be that we won't eat there at all. I take this to mean (contra Vegetarians, and Paleos) that there is no one diet that is best for all people at all times.

The uniqueness of Christianity; as evidence for its veracity

2011-05-29T14:55:00.000-07:00

The popular atheists of our day like to lump all religions (and revelations) together, and so confuse the issue of Christianity's uniqueness.

Quotes and comments;

1. "Nowhere else in human literature, we believe, is the concept of an absolute God presented. And this fact is once more intimately related to the fact that nowhere else is there a conception of sin, such as that presented in the bible.'' [1.]

- Despite the attempts of non-Christians to confuse the matter, the God of the bible is utterly unique; as are other doctrines that concern; creation, sin, the Fall, dominion, redemption, antithesis, evil, special revelation, natural revelation, prophecy, miracles, the incarnation, the atonement, the final judgment, etc.

Other worldviews may appear to have some of these elements, but they turn out to be partial imitations at best. In the biblical view this is evidence for the claim Christianity is both a revealed religion, and the only revealed religion. Neither its God or its main doctrines are appealing to the natural man, so it would appear to be absurd to claim they are human inventions.
Doesn't the hatred these doctrines have been subjected to negate the idea they are human inventions? Why would men invent doctrines they hate?

The answer the non-Christian (e.g. materialist) will make, is that it's very true they weren't invented by reasonable men (e.g. atheists), but were instead invented by men who delighted in their irrationality and perversity. It's my contention that no natural man (and these are the only kind there are if the materialist is correct) would invent such doctrines.

Only after men have received grace do they find any of these doctrines appealing - and even so, its mainly their perceived need that moves them to do so, not their obvious attractiveness or beauty. e.g. the convert to Christianity doesn't see Christ on the cross (atoning for the sins of the annointed) a beautiful thing, but a necessary thing.

If he's a true Christian his heart will break at the thought such a horrific thing had to happen, be reminded of his guilt and thankful for his salvation. (The atheist finds the atonement offensive because he doesn't believe it was necessary.)

2. ''According to the bible, sin has set man at enmity against God.'' [1.]

- To the best of my knowledge the bible is the only book that tells us man is an enemy of God. When people like Richard Dawkins present themselves as enemies of god (and religion), what they mean is that they are enemies of these (false) notions of God. Since they don't believe God exists, they can hardly be (in their minds) his enemies. They thus deny (or reject) the Bible's claim that they are (in reality) enemies of God.
This difference is crucial, as we can hardly expect that the natural man invented a doctrine that claimed he was an enemy (in reality) of God. (i.e. the God who exists)

The fact atheist types deny God exists rather than announcing their rebellion to the living God, is ample evidence this doctrine was not invented. The natural man after all wants to present himself as fair minded, willing to go where the evidence leads - and he can hardly do this if he admits God exists, but then rejects him in rebellion.

Notes;
1. Van Til's apologetic - Greg Bahnsen p. 517.
2. The atheist believes that he can save himself, and thus (or so he claims) finds the atonement offensive.

Stephen Hawking and the search for heaven

2011-05-25T10:03:00.000-07:00

In one of my favorite unaired episodes of star trek, Stephen Hawking is a scientist onboard the Enterprise, and they go in quest of a place called heaven. It turns out to be a place built by beings from another galaxy, that gives people access to other universes.

Quotes and comments;

1. 'A belief that heaven or an afterlife awaits us is a "fairy story" for people afraid of death, Stephen Hawking has said. [2.]

- How does he know this? Unless he knows everyone on earth personally, all he can do is assume (without justification) that everyone is like him. There's no science in such a claim; it's completely without warrant.

2. 'PhysOrg told about 40 studies in 20 countries that indicated belief in an afterlife is “hardwired” into the human brain. “The studies (both analytical and empirical) conclude that humans are predisposed to believe in gods and an afterlife, and that both theology and atheism are reasoned responses to what is a basic impulse of the human mind.” [1.]
- predisposed by what?
- hardwired? how?
- Isn't 'heaven' just a matter of conscious beings being able to imagine various possibilities? (i.e. generic heaven, or generic life after death)

Isn't atheism largely a matter of a certain personality type who loves raining on other people's parades? Isn't there an element of sadism in it? a kill joy spirit? I think atheism stems largely from a dialectical response to theism; that if there were no theists there would be no a-theists, that if there were no theists people like RD would be comfortable speculating on the deity... should such a new development emerge in human culture.

3. 'The 57 researchers were not out to establish the validity of beliefs but to determine whether they are innate or learned. One researcher commented, “Just because we find it easier to think in a particular way does not mean that it is true in fact.” [1.]

- Clearly different people find it easier to think in certain ways; we make a grievous mistake in assuming people are the same, and have the same metaphysical tendencies, likes and dislikes.
This isn't an either or question in my opinion.

4. “If you think of your body as a machine, it’s kind of hard to believe in life after death,” Heflick said. “You’re not going to be able to think of yourself as a spirit.” [1.]

- Materialists haven't been able to understand human consciousness because (for one reason) they see the body as a machine. Machines aren't creative but human beings are. Machines don't have freedom but humans do. Machines are not able to converse, not able to talk, and human beings are. Machines know nothing of words and language, while human beings do. (I realize machines can be made to 'talk' in the sense of producing audible words; but I see this as simulation, not really conversation. Machines can't engage in conversation because they have no self; no personality.)

I believe the key to human consciousness might well be, ''In the beginning was the word..." If man needed words to have thought, and needed thought to have words, it would appear we see in this (chicken and egg type) conundrum evidence for special creation.
The materialist has the problem of telling us how a person can think before they have words, how they can invent language without any words to use as tools, etc. [3.]

If we think of spirit as information we can imagine a new life after death; imagine we exist purely in terms of information prior to being 'reborn' (reincarnated) in a physical form. (I hate to bring Star Trek into it, but if Captain Kirk can be 'dematerialized' and later materialized then I see no reason people can't survive physical death. ie. where is he when he's being beamed up? doesn't he exist solely as information? doesn't he exist in some computer network?)

I hate to speculate (alright I don't) but if Seth Lloyd can claim the universe is a computer, then why can't God (as information) exist on this computer? He wouldn't be equal to it; no more than a womb inhabitant is equal to his mother, but, having his own separate DNA, is separate from her, although dependent upon her.

I'm not saying this is the case; I'm just pointing out that the existence of God-as-spirit is theoretically possible. I personally have no idea how God can exist as spirit, or even what this means exactly; I'm content to have it be a mystery.

Notes;
1. Cosmology, Mythology, and Heaven Creation/Evolution Headlines 05/16/2011
May 16, 2011 — Stephen Hawking’s recent comment that heaven is a fairy tale (see The Guardian) started blogger keystrokes clicking. But one might ask, what does he know about it? Are the opinions of a cosmologist any better than those of a theologian?
2. Stephen Hawking: 'There is no heaven; it's a fairy story'
We see how arrogant the man is, not only in this claim, but in almost everything he says or writes; he clearly suffers from megalomania.

2a. "I regard the brain as a computer which will stop working when its components fail. There is no heaven or afterlife for broken down computers; that is a fairy story for people afraid of the dark," he added.
- You can't get much more patronizing than that can you?

2b. "Science predicts that many different kinds of universe will be spontaneously created out of nothing. It is a matter of chance which we are in," he said.
- Science predicts no such thing. The fact some scientists make this claim is an entirely different matter, and is a claim that may or may not be true. (I give it a one in a quadrillion chance of being true.)

Is personification (and reification) good scientific method? People like Hawking labor hard to make the project of discovery (science) into a kind of infallible god. They clearly show the need for an ultimate authority in their lives; even if it's an impersonal thing like science. Science is a god who is deaf, dumb and blind; and thus one who is forced to speak via scientists... which makes scientists the ultimate authority in culture. (A position they jealousy guard.)

3. The key to understanding human consciousness is throwing out the idea man evolved from an ape like creature without language. I believe only the biblical creation model can lead to an understanding of human consciousness. I don't believe the materialist will ever comprehend it (i.e. in terms of matter in motion).
4. Unaired because non-existent.

The new scientific proof of aliens

2011-05-19T12:47:00.000-07:00

With the advent of the new visualization science (known more popularly as the new mind science) it is now possible to prove, without a shred (or shedding) of doubt that intelligent alien life forms do in fact exist. (That was not a misprint or a misquote. see below)

Quotes and comments;

1. ''If you visualize evolutionary relationships in the form of branching diagrams and then plot them on a time scale, new patterns begin to emerge, with gaps in the fossil record suddenly filling rapidly.”

- Yes, exactly; that's Darwinism in a nutshell.

We have the new atheism, and now we have the new science. We might call it the science of the mind. (Not that the mind exists of course, but we speak loosely.)
Yes; the new mind science, where anything is possible, even life from non-life. What did that jerk Pasteur know anyway; he lived before the new mind science was invented.

Patterns begin to 'emerge' they tell us. Yes, that's about all 'emergence' is; it's the formation of patterns in the brain. Life didn't arise from inert matter in the real world, but in the mind. This makes life on earth about a hundred years old. (Now that's what I call a young earth.)

Apparently this 'fossil record' exists in the mind, or (as real scientists say) in the brain. I agree. I've long contended the textbook version of the fossil record existed mainly in the brain. ("Reality? Who needs that?")

I think we all have to admit that this is certainly an easier way to do science. (Now even people in Cuba, or in hospital beds can do cutting edge science.)

2. 'One of the team members elaborated on the success of visualization and imagination as gap-filling strategies. “It is as if ghosts from the past appear all of a sudden and join their relatives in a big family tree – you have a bigger tree,” he said. [1.]

- Ah yes; Darwinian ghosts, my favorite kind. They populate the pages of textbooks and science mags by the millions. (Cast one out and seven return.)

Yes; the new visualization science... I like it. Before we know it we'll have aliens on the Tree of life, all kinds of them, stretching out beyond mankind.... filling in all the cosmic gaps. This is going to be great. I can hardly wait.
It's going to be a big project transferring all the aliens from SF to the new Evolutionary tree, but I think it's going to be worth it. It's definitely going to be a bigger tree; a much bigger tree.

Nothing like imagination to fill in all those missing links. Who said they would never be found. (The creationists have been proven wrong yet again.) I only hope I can get in on the project, I have a lot of 'creatures' I'd like to add to the tree. The new cosmic tree outdoes the old in that it stretches from one end of the universe to the other.

In the new visualization science if you can imagine something it automatically comes true. (It's all a matter of quantum physics no doubt.) It's the new Ontological argument. (From the new atheists to the new ontologists.)
This may well mean (further study will decide for sure) that every alien imagined by a SF writer is alive and well somewhere in the universe; that via imagination they somehow intuited reality. This is exciting.

3. “This way, you can start analysing observed and extrapolated abundance of species through time, and you can quantify novel origination and extinction events that would otherwise go unnoticed if you were to look at known finds only.”

- What do we call this? the trivialization of reality?

If you can study none existent species on earth, why can't you use this method to study aliens? Aren't they unnoticed merely because they haven't been found? Why should that be held against them? Because they haven't been found doesn't mean they don't exist. That would be as absurd as saying the billions of missing links don't exist because we can't find them. (And surely no one believes that.)

They have to exist, we know that by studying evolutionary theory; their existence is every bit as certain as ours is. We can no more doubt them than we can doubt the earth orbits the big thing out there, you know, that thing that looks hot.

4. 'Another co-author of the paper emphasized the role of “evolutionary thinking” as a substitute for real bones: “Classic text-book views of waxing and waning of groups through deep time will certainly benefit, where possible, from the use of evolutionary thinking.”

- I nominate evolutionary thinking as a substitute for the bones of aliens. (I want to make it clear that I'm not saying I think all aliens have bones. Don't misquote me.)

I like evolutionary thinking, it's almost as good as real thinking, and much easier.

5. 'A peer from the University of Washington seemed delighted with this first-ever detailed study of parareptile relationships, because “we still know very little about their biology.” [1.]

- Well; why do we have to know anything? That's the real question. It's simply old fashioned (part of the old science) to think you have to have some real data before you can study an organism. If you have theory you have all you need, as you can simply visualize the rest. (Whether or not you need to use a crystal is really beside the point, and I don't think we have to get into it at this point.)

6. 'The abstract states that they provided “Phylogeny-corrected measures of diversity” and examined “ghost lineages” – i.e., lineages that should be there if evolution were true, but left no fossils. [1.]

- The mere fact aliens haven't left fossils doesn't mean they don't exist (did I say this before? I'm so excited I can't remember), we know they exist, and since it's technically difficult to visit every planet in the galaxy, it's a perfectly acceptable alternative to just imagine them. It's the new science; and the new science can't be bound by the old (data dependent) science.

It's time to move on; to move beyond the earth and our small, local evolutionary tree, and scamper out onto the branches of the cosmic tree.

In summary,
We can see how the new visualization science promises to shed light into hitherto unnoticed areas of the evolutionary model (dare we say universe). Congratulations team, from all of us here at Thinking About Creation.

Mike Johnson

Notes;
1. How to Fill In Missing Fossils: Imagine Them - Creation/Evolution Headlines 05/09/2011 May 09, 2011 — Evolutionists have long known of systematic gaps in the fossil record. This has been a frequent criticism lodged by Darwin skeptics against the evolutionary notion of a gradually unfolding tree of life. Now, however, it appears that evolutionists have revived use of a tool in their arsenal for combating the critics: imagination. Missing transitions in the record? No problem. Fill them in with “evolutionary thinking.”
2. The anti-creationist Dr. Greg House was quoted as saying, ''Cool!" and popped another Vicodin. I guess that about says it all.
3. This article gives us an example of why Darwinism is unfalsifiable. In the words of the website commentary (which we assume was authored by DC) "You can’t sink an imaginary ship on an imaginary ocean."
4. 'The team led by Dr Marcello Ruta of Bristol’s School of Earth Sciences ... used the evolutionary relationships among known parareptiles to produce a corrected estimate of changing diversity through time.
- They don't 'know' what these relationships are; they just have a model they've fashioned that's to their liking... and they assume it in all they do. This isn't discovery, but interpretation and model building. (Why bother? that's my question. I thought there was supposed to be a drastic shortage of scientists. Is this the best way to employ these people :=}

They can't 'correct' anything since they have no observational data. (Their theories etc. are based on an interpretative model of the fossil rocks; on a model, not data.) Data without interpretation (theory) is meaningless. It's human beings who put (interject) meaning into the data. Interpretations are rarely scientific, but cultural or philosophical spin.

The night has a thousand eyes

2011-05-17T10:08:00.000-07:00

I've got a few comments from a story in Creation/Evolution Headlines. (My favorite website on the Origins issue, and one I recommend highly.)

Quotes and comments;

1. 'You have a biological version of Photoshop in your eyes. That’s what Richard Robinson said in PLoS Biology.
"The eye is not a camera, and the retina is not a piece of film. Indeed, the retina might be better likened to a computer running Photoshop, given the extent of image processing that it performs before passing visual information along to the brain.'' [1.]

- So much for the 'idea' of Dawkins that the eye is a badly designed camera. What we see is that materialists always (always) underestimate the complexity of things. This is an unfailing rule; it's been true as long as the materialists have been giving us pronouncements (let's say several centuries, or more)

Believing that inert matter is the creator of all things, they necessarily believed that all things would be simple; and they've been proven wrong a million times. (Not that it's given them any humility; which is a story in itself, as you wonder how this is possible, how any creature could be so thick, so obtuse.)

The creationist on the other hand believes that an infinitely wise God created all things, and therefore is not surprised to see how complex things are (not that he's not astounded, not that he could have predicted the complexity in its details).

Over and over we see that biological organisms are not like machines but like software. This means that they were created by code not by mechanical application of physical laws working on matter; it means the source of all things is intelligence, not matter in motion, not random chance.

It takes intelligence to see, to produce vision; not mere mechanics. Matter couldn't build an eye because it has no intelligence and no foresight; has no goals. It takes intelligence to create code; as software is developed with a particular purpose in mind.

While it's a great feat to produce a Photoshop like piece of software (to run on a computer) it's orders of magnitude greater to produce 'Photoshop' in a living organism. By any reasonable analogy we should expect a greater intelligence was behind it, and that if it takes intelligence to operate Photoshop it takes intelligence to make eyesight possible, to write the code that makes it all happen automatically. (Despite what materialists say, the ID deduction is a sound one.)

This doesn't prove ID, but it makes any other explanation far more unlikely.

Dawkins was so impatient to dump on creation that he denounced the eye long before he had a clue what was involved in the process of human vision. The man has made a career of jumping to conclusions; to false conclusions that is. What sense does it make to critique something you don't understand? (But then, he's made a career out of doing just that.)

2. 'Robinson was discussing a new find from UC Berkeley that the retina employs both positive feedback and negative feedback systems to improve imaging, something that researchers had missed before in 50 years of study. [1.]

- And what else have they missed?
Every day the materialist has more and more 'miracles' to explain; explain by the process of blind chance and chemical reactions. Every day he sinks deeper into the quicksand. When his head finally goes under he'll realize how little of life he ever saw correctly.

Feedback systems are all the evidence anyone needs to junk the idea of undirected materialism having created the biosphere. There are no feedback systems in inert matter; feedback systems have to be designed and built.

3. “The human eye long ago solved a problem common to both digital and film cameras: how to get good contrast in an image while also capturing faint detail,” the article said, with the headline announcing that the eye does the better job. [1.]

- Matter doesn't (cannot) solve problems, because it has none. What problems could a rock possibly have? How to pay the taxes :=}

Only personal agents solve problems; only intelligent agents solve difficult problems. If the eye works better than any digital camera, it's because it had a designer more intelligent than man. If RD can't see that, it's because he doesn't want to. (Maybe the eye only 'appears' to work better than a camera, maybe it only 'appears' to work like software, maybe it only appears to make the critique of dawkins obsolete and fallacious. Yes, that must be it; it only 'appears' that RD is wrong about things.

4. 'Speaking of vision, eyesight has been found where biologists might have least expected it – in sea urchins... European scientists publishing in PNAS show that the spines transmit light to the animal, making these pincushion-critters like big eyeballs on the seafloor; “we suggest a model in which the entire sea urchin, deploying its skeleton as PRC [photoreceptor cell] screening device, functions as a huge compound eye,” the authors said.

Warning; Speculation ahead;
- The eyes of God are upon us; not figuratively, but literally. ('The night has a thousand eyes' might well be the name of a hymn.)
"Shall he who made the eye not see?" wrote the Psalmist. Every ear and every eye belongs to God; how could he not see or hear?
"By every word you have spoken, shall you be judged." (If all is connected, and matter once created cannot be destroyed, no information is ever lost, and all is available to God.)

M. Johnson

Notes;
The Eyes Have It: Pro Software Creation/Evolution Headlines 05/05/2011
May 05, 2011 — You have a biological version of Photoshop in your eyes. That’s what Richard Robinson, a freelance science writer from Massachusetts, said in PLoS Biology.
2. When I say creationist, unless otherwise noted, I mean biblical creationist.

Is Darwinism cracking at the seams?

2011-05-16T10:50:00.000-07:00

Anomalies to the textbook version of evolution theory continue to be uncovered, but they don't seem to unsettle its adherents. One wonders how much evidence it will take to disprove the materialist model of origins.

Quotes and comments;

1. 'A good scientific theory should predict what is observed. When the theory is confronted with unexpected evidence, should the theory be jettisoned or modified?

'George Poinar at Oregon State is trying to put together the evolution of nematodes (roundworms), which he thinks originated a billion years ago as one of the earliest forms of multicellular life. Here is his explanation for their origin: “They literally emerged from the primordial ooze.” [1.]

- Now that's science boys and girls, not that silly creationist stuff; here we have hard science.
Over half seem parasitic. How can creatures that emerge from the mud be parasites? What would they be parasites on? (i.e. if the were the first or nearly the first creatures to evolve out of the mud.)

2. 'Even though Poinar just wrote a book on nematode evolution, “There’s still a huge amount we don’t know about nematodes,” he admitted – like maybe how something this complex could literally emerge from ooze.

- This 'problem' of nematode emergence is only a problem if you believe the fossil layers reveal the history of billions of years of evolution. It seems clear to me that they don't; and I offer this as evidence. Mud doesn't evolve people... at least not the mud where I live. It seems resistant to evolution for some reason.

Apparently evolution requires mud capable of evolving. Where you get this mud no one seems to know. Maybe instead of looking for the missing link, people should look for the missing mud.

How evolution can be a 'fact' when scientists don't even know where the nematode came from, I don't know. (Maybe the answer is buried in the mud.) Evolution is basically a mud science I guess; if you have evolvable mud, then you can be sure something will emerge from the mud (complete with a body of working parts).

When God fashions Adam out of the mud (clay) it's seen as a fairy tale, when the mud itself fashions a creature it's seen as science :=}
Mud without intelligence is mud my friends; don't we at least know that much after all our studies?

"It's miracle making mud folks, if you're set to create a new planetary world, get yourself some today. It's guaranteed intelligence free."

3. Evolution by subtraction:
'Clearly, a huge amount of new genetic information would have had to accompany the growth of Darwin’s tree of life from root to branch tips. It would also be expected that closely related species would have closely related genomes. That’s apparently not the case with the lab plant Arabidopsis thaliana (thale cress) and the lyre-leaved rock cress.
A press release from Max Planck Institute began, “It would appear reasonable to assume that two closely related plant species would have similar genetic blueprints.” But the lyre-leaved rock cress has a genome fifty percent bigger than the other; “Moreover, these changes arose over a very short period in evolutionary terms.”

- Over and over this is what we see; subtraction not addition (of information) This isn't evolution but devolution; just as biblical creation predicts.

Again we see researchers misled by a fallacious understanding of the fossil rocks. (Question anything, but don't question that.) Sooner or later (in an effort to save evolutionary theory) Darwinists will have to throw out the current model of the fossil record; and they'll have to do it before the continuing contradictions ruin their theory altogether. For the evolutionist, it's a case of either Darwinism being wrong or the fossil model being wrong. (In my opinion it's both.)

4. 'Birds evolved to wash themselves. Pigs evolved to lie in the mud. Can opposite outcomes be ascribed to a scientific law? Victoria Gill at the BBC News had no problem with this, announcing cheerfully and confidently alongside of a contented pig lying in slop, “Pigs have ‘evolved to love mud’”.

- Apparently it's Darwinists who evolved to love mud (see story above about nematodes) If you explain everything in terms of a dumb theory you will be forced to make a never ending series of dumb statements; like the one above for instance.
i.e. if evolution works by blind chance (i.e. is dumb) then the explanation for things is necessarily going to be simple or simplistic. Sophisticated (complex) explanations are ruled out before you start. If you ban intelligence as an explanation your available alternatives will necessarily be dumb. What we see here (and elsewhere) is intelligent people being forced to interpret the world in terms of a dumb theory. Their intelligence is being wasted.

If it's all a matter of chance why not just throw up your hands and say ''stuff happens"? (We might wonder how intelligent people can be to restrict themselves to a theory that's both dumb and impossible, but it's not a matter of intelligence but of an indoctrination into materialism.)

Of course pigs don't love anything, not even mud. It's mere equivocation to use the term 'love' so loosely. Maybe in a world of porn and hookups, no one cares about love anymore. (Materialists have turned our planet into a pornoverse.)
One of the things I most hate about Darwinism is the havoc it's played with our language. Evolution having become de rigeur, equivocation is now the flavor of the day; and has poisoned our communal conversation so thoroughly it's hard to speak sensibly on any subject. (e.g. all animals, including insects have babies, and pigs love mud, and chickens prize their eggs, and wolves have partners, and humans are animals, and birds sing, and whales compose symphonies, and apes speak, and on and on.)

Darwinspeak is a true curse; its own punishment on a culture that's rejected its creator.

5. 'She quoted Mark Bracke [Wageningen University] speculating, “Liking shallow water could have been a point in the evolution of whales from land-dwelling mammals.” After all, he said to his eager reporter, “We all evolved from fish, so it could be that this motivation to be in water could be something that was preserved in animals that are able to do so.”

- Motivation! (see above) Even if this fanciful notion were true, you cannot conflate motivation and instinct.
This nonsense is what happens when scientists reject empiricism for Darwinian daydreaming. (Can we please give up this pipe smoking speculation and get back to real science?)
There can be no real science of origins; all we have, and all we will likely ever have, are speculations of one variety or another. If there is such a shortage of scientists as we're told, why don't we take some of these useless toilers of the Darwinian sea, and employ them more profitably?

I consider the whale story one of the most preposterous of all Darwinian tales, and the most comical. (Would that I could live long enough to see this icon shattered.)

Notice that our friend (Bracke) talks about how 'we' all evolved from fish; we being all us organisms. He puts human beings and nematodes in the same class apparently. (More equivocation.)

Of course no one saw all creatures 'evolve' from fish (''we're all fish now") but apparently this doesn't matter, being an empiricist is too limiting I guess. This notion is a deduction made from the Darwinian (Lyellian) interpretation of the fossil beds. The model is nearly 100 percent interpretation, and if the interpretation is wrong, so are all the deductions made from the original premise.

In place of evolution's pseudo science of origins, biblical creation offers a history of origins. Speculation or history, take your pick. [2.]

Notes;
1. Evolution Bends to Fit the Evidence Creation/Evolution Headlines 05/02/2011
May 02, 2011 — 'A good scientific theory should predict what is observed. When the theory is confronted with unexpected evidence, should the theory be jettisoned or modified?
2. Such is the nature of unbelief that even if we could travel back in time and prove Adam wrote the first chapters of Genesis, the atheist wouldn't accept it the historical account of origins. "Well, I admit he wrote it, but he obviously didn't have a clue what he was talking about. Evolution is a fact, just look at the fossil record."

Calculating God; or, who's in charge here?

2011-05-12T10:58:00.000-07:00

A key concern for any worldview is the matter of authority; of who has the ultimate authority in the system. As RJR used to say; authority is an inescapable concept.

Quotes and comments;

1. The natural man ''thinks of himself as the ultimate judge of what can and cannot be.He will not allow any authority to stand above him, revealing to him what may or may not have happened in the past...'' [1.]

Let;s imagine that one fine day (in May) an alien spaceship (from an obviously advanced species) shows up on our doorstep. (If it can happen in the pages of SF I see no reason it can't happen in reality. Are these writers not our new prophets? Can they all be wrong?) Let's say these aliens are doing some kind of bureaucratic check up. They tell mankind the (horrible) truth; man did not evolve, they say (doing the alien equivalent of laughing) but was a creation of theirs in the distant past.

"How long ago?"
"It's not important."

Now, having placed this scenario in view, we'll ask a question. What do you think our scientific leaders would say to this? How do you think they'd respond? Do you think they'd accept this 'fact' (of small c creation) or would they reject it, and maintain a belief in (M2M) evolution? (Let's add that these aliens are far more advanced in technology, etc. than we earthlings are, that they can prove they've been touring the galaxy for millions of years.

I don't know your answer might be, but I'm sure our elite would not accept the 'truth' of creation, but would continue to believe in the 'myth' of Evolution.

"They can't prove this," someone would say. "We all know evolution is a fact, so they must be lying."
"Why would they lie?"
"How do I know?"
"We can't accept this, it would mean the end of science, it would prove that all our science is wrong, that our methods are wrong. It would mean the creationists could claim they were right, or at least on the right track, and so on."

"What will we do?''
''We'll just wait for them to leave, and then claim it never happened, they never said it, or it was a bad translation ad they never meant it, or they were just engaging in a humorous prank,'' says a cooler voice. "Don't worry. We can handle it."
"But what if it's true?"
"Doesn't matter if it is or it isn't."

Warning; speculation ahead;
Isn't it amazing how well SF writers (and I'm a failed one) can get inside the heads of aliens (even if they don't have any) and can internalize alien psychology? I find this impressive. How'z cum? as R.C. Sproul likes to quip. Is it because man has lost (forgotten) his true identity, and has become alien-ated from God? Just a thought.

Summary;
If we are looking for transcendent wisdom we can either look to aliens for it, or we can look to God. Despite the talk about aliens helping save mankind with advanced knowledge and thinking, it's clear to me that the natural (apostate) man will never accept an authority higher than his own. If I ever saw it happen, I'd fall out of my hyper-space, inter-dimensional traveling pod. (You can see why I failed.)

Mike Johnson [frfarer at gmail.com]

Notes;
1. Van Til's Apologetic - Greg Bahnsen p. 310
2. The natural man claims that he's competent to judge who should have authority over mankind; the Bible (God's word) says that he's not competent to judge.
3. I wasn't being entirely serious in my speculations.
4. My title makes an oblique reference to 'Calculating God' by Robert Sawyer. (As a Canadian I'm required by law, to read him.)

Notes on emergence; or, an alien love story; starring Carl Sagan

2011-05-11T14:04:00.000-07:00

The closing down of the Allen telescope array was a sad event for SETI fans. The whole search for extraterrestrial life (with its speculations about aliens) is an intriguing one; and one I think reveals a lot about human psychology.

Quotes and comments;

1. 'Bob McDonald, commenting on CBC News, feels SETI is worth a lot more than the tens of millions spent on the royal wedding. Just two to three million could have been used to keep SETI going. “That tiny sum pays for a group of very intelligent and highly accomplished people to look for the answer to a fundamental human question, while many times that amount will be spent on security alone for the wedding of two people who have not really accomplished that much.” [2.]

2. 'One of the fundamental unanswered questions in science is whether there is life beyond Earth. [2.]

- I'm interested in why he (or anyone) thinks this is a 'fundamental human question'. Is it? Why is it? How do we explain this? If nothing makes sense apart from evolution (and of course pizza) what's the evolutionary explanation for SETI? What could this possibly have to do with reproduction success rates? Give a slight tug on evolution theory and it unravels. E. theory can't explain this odd human passion; nor can it explain most of the important things in human experience.

If all is merely matter in motion how do we explain that a bit of matter here on earth cares about bits of matter in outer space, in the rest of the universe. That makes no sense to me. Matter doesn't care about anything. The fact McDonald cares about finding aliens is all the evidence he needs to know materialism is a fallacious idea. Materialism is as illusory as green tentacled aliens. If he'd analyze what he said he'd see this.

The materialist can't account for human experience, but instead of curing him of his delusion he pays no attention to this damning bit of knowledge. What he does instead is to say; well, I do care, therefore this creationist is wrong. i.e. he doesn't doubt his materialism, just takes it for granted as true.
If pressed he offers up the idea of emergence. i.e. "yes, it's true Mr. creationist, that matter doesn't care, but people do, and people have emerged from matter and are (obviously you twit) different from matter." The concept of emergence is used to knock down all arguments against materialism.

The concept of emergence is just a ruse in my opinion; nothing but a label on ignorance; a meaningless concept when used in this matter. What we aren't given is an account of how it is philosophical concern (not to mention obsession) can happen in a materialist universe; ie. how does the impersonal become personal. To merely say ''well it emerged I guess'' is to say nothing at all.

3. "The chances of aliens finding the Voyagers in the vast emptiness of space are small—some say infinitesimal—but we took our jobs seriously," recalls team member Ann Druyan. "From the moment when Carl first broached the project to Tim Ferris and me, it felt mythic." [3.]

- It felt mythic she says. I'm not sure what mythic feels like, but how is it a bit of matter can feel 'mythic' about aliens? I don't know how people can believe the theory of cosmic [Cosmos] evolution. The theory demands that a rock transform into a living organism capable of feeling 'nostalgic' for remote life forms it has never seen. I see no way that's possible. The endless stories on how this might have happened (i.e. OOL research) don't impress me in the slightest; one might say they're mythic. (Actually I take back what I said earlier. I do know what it feels like to experience the mythic; I experience it when I read OOL stories.)

Materialism can't give a cogent account for the Voyager love story. (It can't give a good account of much at all when it comes to human experience.) How is it such a worldview is so popular when it fails so badly to offer foundational explanations? Why is it people don't care about this? Why do they care more about phantoms called aliens and nothing about philosophical consistency or cohesion?

4. "I remember sitting around the kitchen table making these huge decisions about what to put on and what to leave off," recalls Druyan. "We couldn't help but appreciate the enormous responsibility to create a cultural Noah's Ark with a shelf life of hundreds of millions of years." [3.]

- They didn't seem to take their responsibility all that seriously when you consider they might have given some alien race the opportunity to wipe out the entire human race. They violated a basic principle; namely don't take a needless risk. What right did they have to put everyone at risk by their publicity stunt?

Remember; these people are merely bits of matter in terms of materialism; a good materialist has to explain all this behavior (thought, etc.) solely in terms of physics. (No wonder they want to contact aliens, no mere human is up to the above task :=}
Maybe the SETI quest isn't really about finding aliens per se; but about finding someone who can explain OOL; someone who can give a believable account of what is now only a miracle. (Though I would argue that a rock [planet earth] managing to build and send out a space ship would be a miracle in itself.)

Among the gifts Voyager bears is 'the brain waves of a young women in love.' (No SF magazine cover of an alien attacking a bimbo? What a missed opportunity.)

5. "I had this idea," recalls Druyan, "that we should put someone's EEG on the record. We know that EEG patterns register some changes in thought. Would it be possible, I wondered, for a highly advanced technology of several million years from now to actually decipher human thoughts?" [3.]

- It doesn't get wackier than that (he said hopefully). How anyone can conflate squiggles on a page with thought I don't know. (Thus reductionism makes fools out of anyone who comes in 'contact' with it.

6. "My feelings as a 27 year old woman, madly fallen in love, they're on that record,” says Druyan. "It's forever. It'll be true 100 million years from now. For me Voyager is a kind of joy so powerful, it robs you of your fear of death." [3.]

- I won't pretend I understand that, but I see evidence here that the SETI project is somehow connected with the idea of immortality, and or the fear of death.

I don't know how she can conflate an image of brain wave patterns with her feelings of being in love. I guess we could call this an example of Reductionism playing the trickster.

7. 'It has been pointed out that the most probable finders of Voyager will be … us. Eventually, technology may allow humans to overtake and recover the distant probes. In that case, they will be reduced to mere time capsules from the year 1977. [3.]

- If we do catch up with it, maybe we could switch the Beatles for the Rolling Stones, or some Dylan :=}

8. 'Arthur C. Clarke recognized this possibility and suggested adding a note to the Golden Record: "Please leave me alone; let me go on to the stars." [3.]

- I note that he said leave 'me' alone. i.e. this is evidence people into SETI are projecting their own psychologies onto Voyager (etc.) It's not really about aliens but about them. It's about their search for something.

Apparently some people want materialism to be true so badly that they're not 'capable' of critically examining the theory, of accepting the sheer impossibility of it, or of examining the oddity of a bit of matter caring about other bits of matter. (Is it that they want materialism to be true? or is it that they don't want God to exist? What's the stronger drive? Maybe they're so connected that it's impossible to say.)
Whatever the love story here is, it's not love for God. It's love for self or love for aliens; since there are no aliens as far as we know, it can only be love for self.
Maybe that's not it; maybe what's going on here is a desire to defend materialism, a desire to defend the act of rejecting God. Maybe the SETI types want to discover aliens to prove to themselves (and everyone else) that they are right about a-theism. Maybe they get involved out of guilt.

9. ''Notwithstanding the low odds of interception, the Voyager Record served as a statement of earthlings to earthlings. The video clip from NASA ends, “What are the odds of a race of primates evolving sentience, developing spaceflight, and sending the sound of barking dogs into the cosmos? Expect the unexpected indeed.“ [1.]

- How do you 'evolve' a passion for ETs? That would appear to be impossible would it not?
What are the odds? Zero; (or as close to zero as you can get).

Summary;
What I think we see in the search for extraterrestrial life, is the search for a substitute for God. We see this search played out in the pages of sf, with its myriad of 'god machines' (called such by the authors themselves) and awesome relics, and awe inspiring aliens. [4.] Evidence for the Bible's claim (echoed by Calvin) that all men know god is the fact aliens have all the attributes of God. e.g. they're at least nearly omniscient; nearly omnipotent; can read minds, send thoughts telepathically, predict the future, etc.

Augustine said 'all men are restless till they find thee' and that man had a God shaped vacuum in his heart. How big the hole in man's heart is, can be seen by the fact it takes the whole universe to even begin to get the job done. I suspect the project to find aliens will only be successful as long as its unsuccessful; that if aliens are found man will still be restless, still need something to fill the hole in his heart.

Cosmic evolution doesn't come remotely close to being able to explain this search for God (or for a god substitute). There's no possible reason man needs such an ability and capacity of this kind, if he's just an animal. (I can't imagine animals care about the SETI project; I can't imagine any of them are sad one of the projects got shut down.)

Men scan the skies for signs of ET, when they'd be better off scanning their own consciousness. The SETI project is all the evidence anyone could need that Materialism is a false metaphysics.

Mike Johnson

Notes;
1. SETI in Reverse Creation/Evolution Headlines 04/29/2011
April 29, 2011 — The SETI Institute has had to close down its search with the Allen Telescope Array (08/12/2010) due to lack of funds.'
2. Big questions and big weddings - Bob McDonald
- the money wasted (surely not) on the Royal wedding could have been better spent on the Allen project complained McDonald.
- how could he say these people haven't done very much? They wave beautifully, they wear clothes well, they smile wonderfully. I could name any number of things they do.
3. Voyager, the love story, April 29, 2011 By Dr. Tony Phillips
- there's nothing like the love for an alien to arouse the human imagination, and send his emotions soaring.
4. Much SF is concerned with presenting the reader with an object or being that the reader can be in awe of. As humans we hunger for the awesome. Here's an example of this 'awesome' storytelling; from 'Alone' by Robert Reed [Godlike Machines ed. J. Strahan]

'The hull was gray and smooth, gray and empty, and in every direction it fell away gradually,
vanishing where the cold black of the sky pretended to touch what was real.
What was real was the Great Ship. Nothing else enjoyed substance or true value.
Nothing else in Creation could be felt, much less understood. The Ship was a
sphere of perfect hyperfiber, world-sized and enduring, while the sky was only
a boundless vacuum punctuated with lost stars and the occasional swirls of
distant galaxies.

The slow miracles of materialism

2011-05-10T12:11:00.000-07:00

In chapter 12 of his book 'The Information' James Gleick offers us some speculation about the origin of life.

Quotes and comments;

1. 'Whatever the basic processes involved, physical or biological, something is under way that begins to resemble computation. [1.]

- Whatever is underway? This is an admission no one (in OOL research) has a clue.

Computation? As far as we know intelligent agents are the only ones capable of computation; either they are the ones who compute, or they are the ones who give this ability to other objects.

So we ask how it is that inert matter can begin to compute? How is it that mere matter can do computations like e = mc2? This appears to be nothing but wishful thinking by the materialist. He can give us no explanation of how this is possible. This is akin to saying a rock can learn to do calculus.

2. 'He applied the idea of logical depth to the problem of self-organization: the question of how complex structures develop in nature. Evolution starts with simple initial conditions; complexity arises, apparently building on itself. [1.]

- Complexity arises? He writes this as if it means something, when it means nothing at all. It's meaningless. This isn't science; no one observed or observes this. This is merely theory dependent speculation. e.g. if materialism is true, we suspect initial conditions must have been simple.

We know how complex structures develop, we don't need to speculate about it. Complex structures develop by the expression of genetic code; the code comes first and the structure after. We know the only source code comes from; intelligence. The great 'problem' that materialists talk about is no problem at all; it's only a 'problem' if you reject God and creation.

3. Let's take a look at the word Compute;
1. 'To determine by mathematics, especially by numerical methods: e.g. computed the tax due.

- As far as I know, rocks have no need to compute anything, and have been left curiously exempt from paying taxes.

Gleick knows how absurd it is to say matter computes things, so he qualifies (in good Fabian fashion) by saying matter 'begins' to compute. This allows the materialist miracle to occur you see. Apparently any miracle is possible if it happens slowly, in stages.

Notes;
1. The Information - James Gleick p. 342

Browsing the Logosphere

2011-05-09T14:33:00.000-07:00

The field of mimetics depends upon god's revelation (of Himself) in creation. It's more than a metaphor to say researchers are reading God's book of creation; this is literal truth.

Quotes and comments;

1. 'We all know how they crawl, but did you know caterpillars invented the wheel? “Some caterpillars have the extraordinary ability to rapidly curl themselves into a wheel and propel themselves away from predators,” the article said. “This highly dynamic process, called ballistic rolling, is one of the fastest wheeling behaviours in nature.” [1.]

- How is it that with this example in front of them some civilizations didn't invent the wheel? Was it because they didn't notice it? Didn't make a connection to human locomotion? because they didn't think creatively? because the wheel was forbidden? God gave them all the help they needed; even if they didn't take advantage of it.

To study a creature is to read the mind of God; or let's say, to acquaint yourself with with one of His thoughts (to acquaint yourself at least partially with divine intelligence.) God gave us all the information we would ever need, when he created the world we (by his grace) live on. The creation is the greatest library ever assembled; and it's free for every man, available to every child. You don't need a library card, all you need is eyes and ears.

We are all creationists; the only difference between the Christian and the materialist is that the christian gives God the credit for the biosphere (the Logosphere as I like to call it) and the materialist does not. We live within God's revelation of himself; we ''live, move and have our existence'' within a steady stream of intelligently composed information. We live within God's mind made incarnate.

I believe this library contains all the knowledge man needs to survive and thrive on planet earth; even knowledge such as that needed to predict earthquakes and avoid them. God has provided for our every need. That we neglect and abuse this gift is no fault of His. If man would rather spend his days high on hallucinogens rather in study of creation is no fault of god's. That man would rather waste his time in hedonistic pursuits than study is man's fault alone. Man has suffered greatly from disease and famine down the millenia, but it has been his own fault; due to his own lack of diligence and study.

"All the treasures of wisdom are found in Christ,'' wrote the apostle Paul, echoing earlier Biblical writers, who wrote of the great wisdom with which god had created the world.) Most of what we call natural evil has not be the fault of god, but the fault of man. (The 'evil' that isn't directly the fault of man, through ignorance, sloth, etc. is the the result of the Fall, which was caused by man's rebellion. eg. mutation.) [2.]

Praise and worship is the only proper response to this great gift; to this great gift giver. (No teacher ever did a fraction as much for his or her students. No lesson has ever been as inspiring as the one God gives all of us every day.) God is our source of wisdom; both creaturely and divine. He is our teacher and our judge; our prophet, king and savior. If man doesn't affirm God's existence it's because he's spiritually dead; poisoned by his own sin and rebellion.

Notes;
1. Animal Tricks Inspire Creation/Evolution Headlines 04/26/2011
2. Is it possible to create a world that doesn't suffer from mutations? I don't know. God (who is infinitely wiser than any of us) tells us 'death' came by sin, so I have to assume that it is possible, even though I don't see how. (I take the position that when Genesis speaks of death coming by sin it's referring strictly to humans.) There's much we can't be certain about at the present time, and may never know for sure.
3. The Logosphere is a data stream that had/has an intelligent source, and that is intelligible.

What is Hell?

2011-05-06T11:19:00.000-07:00

The 'new atheists' like to use the 'horrors of hell' as a way to mock Christianity. It's an outrage, they say. How can anyone hold to such an evil doctrine? What is Hell? Is it real or just a delusion? [Warning; speculation up ahead.]

Quotes and comments;

1. "...you deserve to live forever without God if you do not own and glorify Him as your creator..." [1.]

- In our day (degenerate as it is in so many ways) even so called Reformed theologians and pastors have abandoned the doctrine of Hell. (eg. John Stott) I don't think anyone knows in any kind of exact way what hell is. All the bible clearly reveals to us is that it will be eternal separation from God, and from God's people. If that's all it is, it would be more than enough to fear it, and to see an existence in such a 'universe' as a horrible, painful thing.

If there are one or more universes beyond our own (as cosmologists are beginning to claim) maybe this is what they or it are for. Maybe hell is living in a universe utterly devoid of God and his influence. If man were spiritually alive this would be a fiercesome thing to contemplate. It would mean never meeting Christ or his redeemed. It would mean never living with him for a day, let alone eternity. It would mean never being free of the torments of sin. It would mean never learning the answers to questions that now seem unsolvable mysteries.

To the Christian this would be a horrible thing, and well deserving the name hell. This would mean little or nothing (I assume) to the non-christian. He might even look forward to an existence in the universe called hell. After all, don't some people dream of living forever? Isn't that what the 'transhumanist' movement is all about? Maybe hell is the process of men becoming machines, and losing their humanity. Maybe hell is the 'throwing off' of the image of God. (I don't know if that's possible.)

Is hell a horrific idea? To me it is, I certainly don't want to end up there. So the new atheists are right in saying hell is a horrible idea, but not in the way they suppose. Who knows, maybe hell only looks bad from the outside, from the Christian point of view. (e.g. "If I were to end up in such a place I would feel as if I were on fire, walking through a wasteland of fire, in constant pain and torment.") Maybe it won't seem bad from the inside, by the people living there.

Will people in hell live forever? I don't know. There is no dictionary I can go to that tells me how long the 'forever' in the bible is. Perhaps it (eternity) is forever, perhaps it's only a long time, or as long as one desires.
Can people in hell die? I don't know. Perhaps they can if they want to. Will they want to? Maybe some will and some won't.
Will people be miserable in hell? Perhaps some will and some won't.
Will anyone in hell desire to be in heaven? I don't know; but that would be hell indeed.

M. Johnson

Notes;
1. Van Til's apologetic - Greg Bahnsen/p.128
- quote is from Van Til's pamphlet 'Why I believe in God'
2. I'm not claiming that all of what I've written above is necessarily true.
- I guess that went without saying didn't it.

An early prediction of man's greatness

2011-05-05T09:45:00.000-07:00

The atheist in our day likes to claim that people believe what the Bible says simply because they have to. This is a distortion of the actual case. I believe the Bible is what it says it is because what I read there impresses me it is indeed the word of God.

It's easy to forget how 'spot on' the Bible was in its characterization of man. In the first few chapters of Genesis (written originally perhaps 6000 years ago) we read that man was created in God's image. We can see this as a prediction of man's future greatness. It expresses a profound understanding of man's intellectual capacities.

Remember that this was before the pyramids, before Pythagoras, before Euclid and Galen, before the Parthenon and Plato, before the great cathedrals, before the universities, before Kepler and Newton, before the microscope and the computer.

Thousands of years before all this (evidence of man's greatness) when man was still dressed in animal skins, the writer of Genesis tells us man was made in the image of God (the all wise creator of heaven and earth). If that's not enough to knock your socks off - you aren't wearing any :=} I find this to be a staggering confirmation of the Bible's divine origin; confirmation it is what it claims to be.

Summary;
I'm afraid people are so used to hearing the phrase 'in the image of God' that they've lost sight of how staggering an idea (conception of reality) this is. Only the One who created man truly knows who he is, and what he's capable of.

Notes;
1. I agree with the scholars who claim Genesis was likely compiled by Moses (and or those associated with him) from ancient records that went back to the pre-Flood world, and all the way back to creation and Adam.
- e.g. all throughout Genesis, new passages are introduced by the phrase ''these are the records of..."
2. I'm aware that the 'liberal' (Humanist) scholar rejects the above view; but even given that, Genesis still stands as an amazing 'prediction' or understanding of man's intellectual capacity.

A refutation of Richard Dawkins

2011-05-04T11:07:00.000-07:00

When he makes his attacks on Christianity, Richard Dawkins doesn't have an epistemological leg to stand on. Given his worldview he has no basis for the criticisms he makes.

Quotes and comments;

1. 'New Scientist has posted several articles recently about the subject [free will]. In one, MacGregor Campbell promoted the answer from some secular neuroscientists that free will is an illusion.
The video states without criticism that “every choice you have ever made was predetermined billions of years ago at the moment of the big bang...” [1.]

- That my friends is the ugly reality of materialism. A consistent application of its message would entail the death of all we consider human.

In other words, Einstein formulating his famous equation was just a matter of physics; a moment predetermined at the moment of the big bang. This show us the falseness and inadequacy of materialism to provide the foundation for a livable worldview.

If my every 'choice' was predetermined, it wasn't a choice then was it?

Notice how materialists will tell you how evil the Bible's message of predestination is... but then have a secular version of their own? They don't seem to find anything evil about that. Ever wonder why that is? (I don't think you'll have to ponder the question long to get an answer.)

Christianity asserts that both God's predestination and man's freedom are possible. How this can be we don't know; we must accept God's word for it, accept that he is much more wise than we, that he comprehends the true nature of reality while we do not.

There can be no freedom for the materialist; not if he's honest.

That the materialist believes this metaphysical view, but then goes on to criticize Christians makes no sense at all. e.g. the anti-theist campaign of Rich Dawkins. [2.] There's utter hypocrisy in 'preaching' change to people who aren't free. You have no right to criticize someone if they bear no responsibility for their behavior. Dawkins shows himself to be an intellectual buffoon. On the basis of his very own worldview, he has no basis for criticizing anything. If all was determined at the moment of the big bang he should shut his cake hole.

How this scenario can explain the fact I'm a creationist and Dawkins is a materialist I don't know. Was the Big Bang undecided about the origins issue, and what had caused it? Maybe MacGregor can tell us :=}

2. 'As scientific justification for these radically deterministic views, the narrator says, “Many neuroscientists think that what we call free will is just the result of electrical and chemical signals in the brain, explainable ultimately by the laws of physics.” [1.]

- I take it this means there is no free will.
If there is no free will how could you know this? i.e. how could you know anything? If you're not free to accept or reject an idea about X, you can't be said to know X. All you have is an opinion. We see here that m. destroys the ability to have knowledge. If we do have knowledge (and I think we do) it's only because materialism isn't true.

If there is no free will, all my opinions were forced onto me; the outcome of a chain of reactions going back to the Big Bang, and thus I have no knowledge, and can acquire no knowledge. i.e. not in the sense we think of knowledge. (My opinion might be correct but I couldn't be said to know it. I wouldn't be able to justify holding it... as I had no choice in the matter.)

If neuroscieentists had no free will why would their opinions be worth listening to? They're not speaking trruth to the universe, but are only repeating opinions, are only repeating opinions under duress.

If there is no free will it's hard to imagine how creativity is possible. Doesn't creativity depend on freedom?

If there were no free will it's hard to see how people could even think. At best we would be animal type robots. Isn't thinking evidence for free will?

The language here is confusing. If free will is the 'result of' electrical and chemical signals it would still exist... but I don't think this is what the author means. I think he's claiming free will is an illusion. (If it was merely an illusion how would you know this?)

3. “Free will: the illusion we can’t live without.” [1.]

- An illusion we can't live without is a strange kind of illusion isn't it? We normally think of an illusion as something we don't need; as something we can easily live without.

One wonders how X can be an illusion if it's necessary for our survival. Isn't that too a strange kind of illusion? Isn't the fact we can't live without it evidence the claim is false?

Scientists can't tell us whether we have free will or not. Scientists can't tell us whether all acts were predetermined in the big bang. The belief the lab coats can answer all questions is a delusion; a delusion called scientism.

In terms of biblical creation, an 'illusion' we can't (honestly) live without isn't an illusion; not God, and not free will. (The same goes for truth, moral truth, love, reality, Design, the mind, etc.)

4. 'freelance writer Dan Jones again gave the scientific edge to neuroscientists who present the “manifest truth of determinism”. [1.]

- If materialism were true, there would be no truth. The concept is meaningless in a universe determined by matter in motion. A little reflection shows this I believe. (I guess science types don't think they have to study philosophy anymore. Maybe they think they can discover philosophical truths in the lab, or see them in a microscope.)

To acquire true knowledge a subject must be free of the cause and effect chain of material determinism. He must transcend the mere flow of matter. If he doesn't transcend matter, his opinion is just the 'opinion' of matter on matter; ie. it's not a truth claim but a chemical reaction.

Can there be truth without error? but if all is matter in motion there can be no error. ie. how can a chemical reaction be an error?

If the Big Bang produced richard dawkins what produced the big bang? Something very strange must have been going on :=}

This notion plays havoc with our theories of causation. It reduces all causal agents to one; ie. the big bang is the cause of everything.
eg. Q. What caused me to spill my coffee? A. the big bang. (Since the cosmologists can't tell us what caused the big bang, the final cause of everything is a mystery.)
Q. What caused X, Y, or Z? A. Who knows? Stuff happens.

If you reject God and creation, this is the hopeless position you find yourself in. i.e. the cause of all things is unknown. God is thrown out in favor of the unknown. This is an unknown that will never be known; so the only alternative to creation is to have no answer at all.

Addendum;
5. 'He made matter-of-fact statements claiming materialism is scientific truth, such as Francis Crick’s remark, “you are nothing but a pack of neurons.”

- When you read phrases like 'nothing but' you know you're being fed some reductionism.
Crick is wrong. The most vital aspect of a human being is not the matter he's made of (e.g. neurons) but the information that has coded that matter. i.e. you are matter plus information; you are informed matter. (You are information made incarnate.)

I deny the claim matter in motion can compose true (specified, complex) information. We only know of one source of life giving information.

Mike Johnson

Notes;
1. Scientists Invade Religion Creation/Evolution Headlines 04/21/2011
2. Squawkin' Dawkins as I call him.
- Although Dawkins speaks of the 'god delusion' in reality, given his metaphysics, everything has to be an illusion. His model of reality claims that only matter exists, and that reality exists at the invisible level. He claims man is a 'robot slave' that is manipulated by genes. Every thought of man then is gene given; has its source in the gene's desire to reproduce, and thus can't be trusted to reflect reality. Given all this he has no way to posit truth or reality. Everything must be an illusion given that metaphysics and that epistem0logy. When he looks in the mirror he sees an illusion. When he looks out the window he sees an illusion. There cannot be something called reality for such a worldview.

All men know God

2011-05-02T17:31:00.000-07:00

People in our day claim the evidence for God's existence is either slim or none. The bible has a different take. It declares that all men know God, that the evidence for his existence is inescapable.

Quotes and comments;

1. 'God has revealed himself to all men, providing evidence that justifies belief in his existence and character...' [1.]

- Men can't escape the evidence for God. It's everywhere he looks; from the microscopic to the macroscopic; from the microsphere to the macroshere; from the cell to the seashell, from the tree to the birds, form the Manatee to the mind of man. From the size of DNA to the size of the cosmos. (Some men are staggered by the size of the universe, and hold this out as 'evidence' God doesn't exist. "Why would God have created such a vast surplus" they ask. The size of the universe is nothing compared to the staggering complexity of the cell. Men should be far more impressed by the tiny cell than they are by the vast universe.

The evidence for God's existence is available to all men; no one has gone without it (been cut off from it). The evidence has been available to all men - and it has impressed all men. No one has failed to be impressed with the world, with the universe. From the very beginning men have been astounded by the world (the logosphere) and the creatures in it. They've studied the world, wrote poems in praise of it, sung songs about it, wrote endless books about it. To say they've been impressed would be an understatement.

What men have not always done is give God the credit. Men have been liberal in their praise of the creation, but stingy in their praise of the Creator.

Notes;
1. Van Til's apologetic - Greg Bahnsen p.184

The meme and the mime

2011-04-29T13:02:00.000-07:00

In chapter 11. (Into the meme pool) of 'The Information' Gleick shows himself to have been heavily influenced by the ideas of Richard Dawkins. We might say he becomes a Dawkins mime. Painful as it is, I need to respond to this chapter in quite a bit of detail.

Quotes and comments;

305. 'Rhyme and rhythm help people remember bits of text. Or: rhyme and rhythm help bits of text get remembered. Rhyme and rhythm are qualities that aid a meme’s survival, just as strength and speed aid an animal’s.

- The chapter has become a parade of stupid remarks. The pathetic fallacy marches on.
Just as? Hardly. The conflate a biological organism with an abstract object violates all we know about doing science. (The next thing we know, he'll tell us that memes also bleed. "Do I not bleed?" said the meme.)

Since Gleick is so big on science, maybe he can tell us how we could determine whether the meme idea is scientific. Obviously if one wants to, one can think of the meme as alive; but is it? and is that a scientific idea? Is it testable? Is it falsifiable? This is nothing more than an intellectual game (hopefully it's just a hula hoop type fad.)

We see in the meme idea how vitally important one's perspective is; ie. it determines what a person will make of the data. (If the meme idea is true, then anything can be true; all one has to do is claim that it's true. What couldn't be true if our standards for truth are set this low?

Are martians real because some people believe martians exist? Are aliens real because some people think they exist? Are aliens an invading virus? (i.e. is the meme alien an invading virus?)
Is time travel real because we have the time machine meme?
Is evolution true because we have the evolution meme? (I think m2m evolution is about as valid a concept as the meme concept.)

305. 'Like genes, memes have effects on the wide world beyond themselves: phenotypic effects.

- Like genes? I don't think so. There's a load of presuppositions embedded in that one small word. Memes aren't like genes at all... at least not in any real sense. This is poetic licence at best. Are memes made of code? do they produce proteins and cells? do they have error detection devices? Do they have code for writing code? Are they composed of chemicals?

If we want to bring at least a little common sense into this meme discussion we should take note of the fact there is no such thing as a generic meme. There are only memes created by human beings. Memes don't have an independent existence; but yet this is how dawkins speaks of them.

This is a deeply anti-human way of looking at the world. Dawkins likes the idea because it allows him to call god a virus. ie. people don't believe in god because of evidence, or reason, but because they (helpless victims) were attacked by a nasty virus. His meme idea is demeaning, degrading and offensive. It dehumanizes people. (The more offensive an idea is to christians the more dawkins is attracted to it. This focus seems to control what ideas he adopts or rejects in his so called 'science'. The direction his 'science' goes is controlled by his hatred of christianity. That this should be called neutral science is a farce.)

The reason some people are christians and some are not is due to the unknown vagaries of virus infection. No idea could be more demeaning, more uncivil... or more demented. (Does dawkins thank his lucky stars he never got infected? Why does he give himself any credit for his atheism if it's all dependent on not catching a virus?)

In dawkins we have the bizarre picture of a person who claims to be a Humanist, but who has formulated the most inhuman (anti-human) ideas ever dreamt of. (eg. the selfish gene scenario and the meme/virus scenario)

306. 'Memes can replicate with impressive virulence...'

- Nonsense. Things don't do anything with virulence. Good grief. Only people act with virulence (one of them is lurking in the background of this discussion.) This is another example of anthropomorphism and personification. (The whole meme idea depends on this bit of confusion.) Gleick is confusing science with poetry.

Virulent;
1. 'Bitterly hostile or antagonistic; hateful: virulent criticism
2. Very bitter or spiteful; malignant: as, a virulent invective
- it's true that people refer to diseases as virulent, but this is a metaphor. Matter has no will; it's impersonal. It has no feelings.

306. ''When you plant a fertile meme in my mind you literally parasitize my brain, turning it into a vehicle for the meme’s propagation in just the way that a virus may parasitize the genetic mechanism of a host cell. And this isn’t just a way of talking...'' - NH

- It seems H. doesn't understand the meme project all that well. He should have written; "when a meme plants itslef in my mind, it literally parasitizes my brain...'' See the difference?

In just the way a virus? Not even close. This is more poetry.
A fertile meme? Only living organisms are fertile. Ideas are not fertile. They have no ovaries.
Yes Nick, this Is just a way of talking. (If it's not, prove it with a scientific experiment. Show me a way to falsify it. Show me a way to test it.

What a hopeless dead end this meme project is. Nothing good will come of it. It's just more of the dehumanizing project gifted to us by reductionism.

306. '...the pioneering ethologist W. D. Hamilton, reviewing the book [Selfish Gene]for Science, ventured this prediction:
"Hard as this term may be to delimit—it surely must be harder than gene, which is bad enough—I suspect that it will soon be in common use by biologists and, one hopes, by philosophers, linguists, and others as well and that it may become absorbed as far as the word “gene” has been into everyday speech.''

- Why would anyone have such a bizarre hope? He hopes to see the dehumanizing of man? (Of course people like Dawkins can only imagine the meme idea as a weapon to attack Christians (etc.) they don't foresee it being used as weapon against them. Make no mistake; the meme was invented as weapon to attack christianity.)

You can't define (limit) meme because it doesn't exist. A gene is real, and a meme is not. The gene can be an object of scientific study, while the meme cannot.

If these people love science so much, why are they favoring such non-scientific claptrap as the meme idea? (But perhaps it's only some genes at work; prompting them to make fools of themselves against their will.)

If dawkins is correct about his view of the gene (as master of its human slaves) he cannot be right about the meme. Why? This can't be a true idea, because there could be no truth in a selfish gene model of the universe. ie. if the only reason we think, say or do anything is the influence of genes, the concept of truth disappears.

307. '...for most of human history memes and language have gone hand in glove.

- Seems strange the meme was only invented in 1976 then doesn't it?
A meme is like a gene the way a hand is like a glove :=}

307. "Well, now, Walton’s own viral text, as you can see here before your eyes, has managed to commandeer the facilities of a very powerful host—an entire magazine and printing press and distribution service. It has leapt aboard and is now—even as you read this viral sentence—propagating itself madly throughout the ideosphere.'' - Hofstadter

- The meme idea is evidence for me that intellectuals in our day are not serious thinkers at all. They prefer playing games to seeking the truth; being silly to be serious; having fun rather than being logical; etc. (They sure haven't spent much time critiquing materialism or evolutuion theory.)

A meme has 'commandeered' the staff of a magazine! Oh what fun we're having now. Break out the beer and noise makers.

308. 'Hofstadter gaily declared himself infected by the meme meme.'

- My point exactly. (see comment above)
If he's been 'infected' by anything, it's silliness.

309. “The computers in which memes live are human brains.”

- The brain is not a computer for one thing; memes aren't alive for another. The man has been self-deluded into taking his reification as real. He's trapped within the confines of the pathetic fallacy. (But I guess we can't blame him, all this nonsense is only the work of his selfish genes after all, and what can a poor slave do but obey his masters?)

310. 'In bioinformatics, chain letters are an object of study. They are memes; they have evolutionary histories.

- Apparently the word evolution no longer has any meaning.
Maybe it's only as real as memes are; i.e. an invention of the human mind; simply a way of looking at things. People capable of treating memes as real and alive are clearly capable of inventing something as impossible as macro or cosmic evolution. It's clear to me that neither reality nor logic has any restraint on their speculations.

We've seen how the meme mavens don't mind engaging in personification and reification, so why would the darwinists have minded a few logical fallacies and inventions? Natural selection gets reified, and turned into a creative agent (rather than a banal weeding out process). Time is the hero of the plot sounds a lot like a meme doesn't it? Uniformitarianism is just a way of looking at things after all; it's certainly not true.

310. “And if any man shall take away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God shall take away his part out of the book of life” [Revelation 22:19].

- This is clearly proof the bible is a meme. It's a scientific fact, as real as the earth orbiting the sun.
Gleick just couldn't resist the temptation to disparage the bible and christians could he? You see, people don't believe the bible because they're convince it's true. Oh no. They believe it because they (poor helpless victims) were infected by a nasty virus. He might as well spit on them. (The motivation for this game is hatred, and a desire to attack christians and Christianity.)

I don't suppose evolution or atheism are nasty viruses attacking innocent victims are they? (I guess there's some scientific method that allows them to distinguish good viruses from bad ones :=} What a farce.

311. “These [chain] letters have passed from host to host, mutating and evolving,” they reported.
"Like a gene, their average length is about 2,000 characters..."

- Like a gene eh?
A letter is like a gene is it? That would mean that an intelligent agent composed it wouldn't it? These people are having so much fun they don't see what the implications of what they're saying.

I can't believe anyone takes this stuff seriously; but then again, it is academics we're dealing with here... and nothing is too silly for them to study and waste their time on.

311. "Like a potent virus, the letter threatens to kill you and induces you to pass it on to your “friends and associates”

- Like a potent virus? I don't think so. This 'equation' they've made exists only in their mind. There is no real identity here at all. There isn't any real similarity. These people have deluded themselves. This equation is not in the data, but in the (fanciful) interpretation of the data.

A letter doesn't threaten to kill someone, a person does. (These are the same people who claim it's guns that kill; apparently they mean it literally.)

312. "Like an inheritable trait, it promises benefits for you and the people you pass it on to. Like genomes, chain letters undergo natural selection and sometimes parts even get transferred between coexisting “species.

- Maybe some of the radical deconstructionists are correct, and words really don't have any meaning. That's the only conclusion I can make from this incoherent statement.

You can get an idea from this how loose the current generation is with their language and their thinking. Apparently anything goes... as long as people like it; as long as it's user friendly. This explains for me how so many people can believe in a materialist creation of the life forms on this planet. ie. they believe the impossible; they believe it because they want to. Cosmic evolution is just words on a page; that's the only 'reality' it has. If people can believe the quote above, they can believe anything.

313. “Memes have not yet found their Watson and Crick,” said Dawkins; “they even lack their Mendel.”

- We see a frightful example here of scientism; the idea you can study all subjects (even human experience) with the same methods you use to study a rock.
More anthropomorphism by the world's favorite mystic.

313. 'In the competition for space in our brains and in the culture, the effective combatants are the messages.

- There's a mindless stupidity in the claim messages compete (compete for brain space yet). People compete, messages do not. People may (and do) use messages to facilitate competition but that's a different matter. If a person can't realize a category mistake, there's not much you can say. (Maybe we should charge some memes with false advertising, and let the business owners go free. Maybe some memes should be charged with racism, and that great sin homophobism :=}

314. “The human world is made of stories, not people,” writes David Mitchell.

- It's hard for me to imagine a more stupid, absurd statement.
The human world doesn't have any humans in it? Good grief. I thought this man was supposed to be able to write.

I wonder if stories bleed. ("Do I not bleed when you stick me with a pin,'' the story said.)
This is more death of man theology. (When I first heard RJR say that the death of god theology will lead to the death of man theology I couldn't figure out what he meant. I've since learned.)

314. “The people the stories use to tell themselves are not to be blamed.”

- That's clever David. It's also meaningless. (Only when people play with words do stories have selves.)
That's the whole point of the meme idea (as I said earlier) Memes mean never having to say you're sorry. Memes mean no one is responsible for their actions.

In that case why do we still have laws, courts and jails? We have them because you can't live in conformity with a false idea. e.g. materialism.

If people want to look at the world this way (and stand on their head to do it) I can't stop them. If people want to believe in materialist origin scenario I can't stop that either.

314. 'Margaret Atwood writes: “As with all knowledge, once you knew it, you couldn’t imagine how it was that you hadn’t known it before.

- The biblical writers were well aware of man's propensity for self-deception. "And imagining themselves to be wise, they became fools." This isn't knowledge, it's a self-serving delusion. (Few things could be more comical than a 'science' of memes. I wonder if it will conform to the Dover judge's definition :=}

314. 'Fred Dretske, a philosopher of mind and knowledge, wrote in 1981: “In the beginning there was information. The word came later.”

- Is that empirical science I wonder. Anyone observe this? If by word he means intelligence, I disagree. There can be no information with an intelligent source. (This at least is what we observe, when we do investigation of the real world.)

Actually the information in the cell is many (many) times more complex and sophisticated than the human alphabet. There's really no comparison.

315. He added this explanation: “The transition [from molecule to man] was achieved by the development of organisms with the capacity for selectively exploiting this information in order to survive and perpetuate their kind.” Now we might add, thanks to Dawkins, that the transition was achieved by the information itself, surviving and perpetuating its kind and selectively exploiting organisms.

- There you have it; the world turned upside down... and all to defend materialism.
There isn't a molecule of real science in this view. This is merely metaphysical speculation. Dawkins has abandoned empirical science, and has become a kind of secular Swedenborg. Only he hears the true word, only he possesses the truth.

314. 'When a jingle lingers in our ears, or a fad turns fashion upside down, or a hoax dominates the global chatter for months and vanishes as swiftly as it came, who is master and who is slave?'

- In the PC world it's forbidden for man to be a slave master, but it's okay for him to be a slave. Apparently we're all robots being controlled by memes and by genes. This is surely the most bleak view of mankind that there has ever been.

Summary;
Ch. 11. of this book (Into the meme pool) is probably the stupidest, nonsensical, fallacious chapter I've ever read.
"Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools..." (Romans 1:22)

Notes;
1. The Information - James Gleick
2. Mime;
"a buffoon who practices gesticulations" [Johnson], c.1600, from Fr. mime, from L. mimus, from Gk. mimos "imitator, actor, buffoon," of unknown origin. The verb meaning "to act without words" is from 1610s; the transferred sense of "to imitate" is from 1733 (Gk. mimeisthai meant "to imitate").

Richard Dawkins and the pathetic fallacy

2011-04-28T15:37:00.000-07:00

Looking again at 'The Information by James Gleick. I want post some notes on the subject of personification. The subtitle is; the gene/meme machine runs off the road

Quotes and comments;

301. 'Natural selection directs the whole show.' - Gleick [1.]

- I see no evidence natural selection [NS] is a creative force. This isn't a fact, it's a claim. In my opinion it's a claim without a warrant. NS doesn't create new information or new organs or organisms; all it does is work on things already in existence. e.g. weeding out the lame and the weak isn't a creative process, nor is 'favoring' slight variations and 'disfavoring' others.

More personification on display here. NS is portrayed as the conductor of an orchestra.

301. "Ideas have retained some of the properties of organisms. Like them, they tend to perpetuate their structure and to breed; they too can fuse, recombine, segregate their content; indeed they too can evolve, and in this evolution selection must surely play an important role

- Retained?
Ideas and organisms can't be spoken of in the same terms. They're radically different entities. (You'd think scientists would know this; aren't they big on classification.) This is nothing but poetry (bad poetry). This isn't science. We don't observe any of this. This is just giving the data a twisted interpretation.

I can't believe these people are serious.... I really can't. This is light years beyond silly.
To say ideas evolve is pathetic. This is just equivocation. (You'd think scientists would want to use words more carefully. Isn't precision a goal of science?)

This is an anti-scientific and poetic way of looking at things. I suppose we should have expected it; this is the nonsense that results when scientists try to take over all areas of life.

301. 'The American neurophysiologist Roger Sperry had put forward a similar notion several years earlier, arguing that ideas are “just as real” as the neurons they inhabit.

- I thought only the physical was real.
Gee; if ideas are real then god is real. How do these guys go on to deny the existence of god given this wacky metaphysics of theirs?

301. ''Ideas have power, he said.
Ideas cause ideas and help evolve new ideas. They interact with each other...''

- This is the sad result of reductionism. It's people who have ideas, people who have power, people who evolve' new ideas. It's people who interact with each other. We see here the death of man (the death of god theology morphed into a death of man theology) Under the reductionist rubric, man disappears from the scene... being replace by the brain, and by ideas, chemicals, information.

This isn't science, this a kind of dehumanizing religious view. (It's as if some people had a lust to degrade mankind; themselves being exempt of course.)

302. "And they [ideas] also interact with the external surroundings to produce in toto a burstwise advance in evolution that is far beyond anything to hit the evolutionary scene yet.'' - Roger Sperry

- So; ideas are the cause of evolution eh? Hmm. Sounds a lot like saying ideas are the cause of creation :=}

This is more equivocation. ie. any change caused by human ideas (not ideas generic) is not (by any definition) evolution. We're told over and over that e. is a natural, undirected process. It's simply bad science (bad method) to call human intervention by the same name as darwinian evolution.

Ideas haven't caused technology (and its effects) it's been people who have done this. (What warrant does he have to strip credit from the real people who were responsible and to hand the credit to some phantasm called an idea?) This is a dehumanizing way to speak.

302. 'Richard Dawkins made his own connection between the evolution of genes and the evolution of ideas. His essential actor was the replicator, and it scarcely mattered whether replicators were made of nucleic acid.
His rule is “All life evolves by the differential survival of replicating entities.”

- Scarcely mattered! Give me a break. Is it good science to equate biological actors with immaterial objects? Is that considered good method?

His rule? is this a rule he discovered looking into a microscope or a telescope?
This isn't a fact, it's just a claim. It's not an observation, it's just a spin on the data.

All life? how can a scientist equate a living organism with an abstraction called an idea? Do ideas breath? Do they excrete? (Well, maybe some of his do.) Is that good science? Is that good method? This is more reductionism. This is getting close to saying all things are just numbers, or it's all just math. (Or it's all just information.)

To conflate biological replicators (having DNA, etc.) with ideas is a confusion of categories. Is to do so considered good science? To say a cell and an 'idea' are both replicators is to spout nonsense. Such a statement has no meaningful content. Maybe this is truly how things appear to him, but if it is, he's deluded.

His claim isn't in any way scientific. (Am I at war with 'science' if I point out these absurdities?)

As usual dawkins is ignoring the problem of information; of where new information comes from. (Does he have a 'replicator' for that? Not that I know of.) In this fantasy version of the real world, you don't need a source of information.

302. “I think that a new kind of replicator has recently emerged on this planet,”
he proclaimed at the end of his first book, in 1976.

- An idea isn't alive; not in any scientific sense of the word. It's merely a greeting card variety of metaphor that supports his claim. He's confused metaphor and reality.

302. 'For this bodiless replicator itself, Dawkins proposed a name. He called it the meme, and it became his most memorable invention...'

- A bodiless replicator eh? Sounds as real as his original replicators, or any of those dreamt up by the OOL crowd.

For someone who claims to be a defender of science, dawkins is awfully big on metaphors isn't he? In fact he depends on them. He's a kind of darwinian poet. He gives things new names, he invents names, he invents stories, puts spin on things, looks at things upside down, goes about standing on his head. It's all great fun I guess; but it's not science.
- I thought for the materialist only the physical was real. What's his foundation for calling ideas real?

Materialism;
1. The theory that physical matter is the only reality and that everything, including thought, feeling, mind, and will, can be explained in terms of matter and physical phenomena.
- I don't know how a materialist can call ideas real, alive and evolving; not without betraying his own worldview. There's no way he reason consistently and logically from one to the other.
2. 'The metaphysical doctrine that matter is the only substance, and that matter and its motions constitute the universe.
3. 'The doctrine that all phenomena are to be accounted for by the fortuitous concourse of atoms, in connection with certain laws or tendencies toward laws...
- the materialist must contend that ideas are the product of a fortuitous concourse of atoms. e.g. the theory of e. must be explained purely by physics. (I think this is impossible, even for a word spinner like Dawkins.)

Here's a comical instance of dawkins defending materialism by denying materialism. ie. only if m. were untrue could his claim make sense.

302. “Memes propagate themselves in the meme pool by leaping from brain to brain via a process which, in the broad sense, can be called imitation,” he wrote. They compete with one another for limited resources: brain time or bandwidth.

- Is that a testable claim? If it's not, it's not science. This is typical Dawkins; giving his reductionist spin on things and calling it science.

Memes a leapin' - gee; must be spring. (Maybe the royals ought to make Dawkins poet laureate.)

I see that man himself has disappeared into the reductionist void gifted to us by scientism.
To say ideas compete is just plain silliness. Only people compete. Is this kind of equivocation (and reification) good science? Is this good method? (That Dawkins presents himself as a defender of scientific method is a farce. He believes in the poetic method to be sure; but not the empirical method.)
- see my post; Whatever happened to (real) science?

303. Speaking of memes in music, Gleick writes; 'This one,
a notorious though shorter-lived invader of brains, overran an immense population many times faster.

- Yes; we're back to yesterday's post and the replicator invasion [see the invasion of the replicators]. To speak of ideas as invaders of brains is both stupid and grotesque. (Man is the 'missing link' in this new anti-human theology of reductionism.) To speak of ideas overrunning a population is meaningless. It has no scientific content. This is poetry not science. I thought there was no place for poetry in science. (e.g. Genesis), but I guess it's only 'religious' poetry that's been banned. Apparently Darwinian poetry is permitted.

303. 'Even more pervasive and indelible are the smile of Mona Lisa, The Scream of Edvard Munch, and the silhouettes of various fictional extraterrestrials. These are memes, living a life of their own, independent of any physical reality.

- I have no idea how that makes sense in terms of materialism.
It's nonsense to speak of ideas as living. (I realize that biblical writers refer to scipture as the living word, but that certainly doesn't apply to so called memes - though this might be where the meme idea came from.) This isn't science. Empirical science has been abandoned; even as its great defenders claim to be defending it against creationism.

It's only a theist who has the right to speak of an entity existing independent of physical reality. (Here we have the irony of the materialist defending materialism by adopting, for the moment, the metaphysics of theism.) R. Dawkins claims that god cannot possibly exist, because nothing that doesn't have a physical form can exist. ie. god as spirit is an impossibility. Apparently a meme can do what god cannot. (This makes no sense to me, but then I'm not a physicalist.)

Memes are living a life of their own eh? I wonder if anyone's told them :=} Good grief. (Is the god meme alive and well and living a life of his own? Is that the new theology? Let's see; if the god meme is alive, does this mean he can communicate with me, and I with him? What would this mean? Does this mean prayer is valid after all?) This meme idea deserves only to be laughed at. (When I say that I mean it's replicators deserve to be laughed at.)

303. 'Memes emerge in brains and travel outward, establishing beachheads on paper and celluloid and silicon and anywhere else information can go.

- We have 'memes' and brains, but no people apparently. (I wonder if James Gleick exists; maybe he's just a meme.) This is a horrid way to speak.
Travel outward? more personification.
Establish beachheads? more personification.
Establish a beachhead on paper and silicon? more poetry and personification.
- is personification good science? Is it good method? I thought science was all about depersonifying nature. I thought it was a great 'crime' to personify nature, or anything in nature. Whatever happened to that?

Personify;
1. 'To treat or regard as a person; represent as a rational being; treat, for literary purposes, as if endowed with the sentiments, actions, or language of a rational being or person, or, for artistic purposes, as if having a human form and nature.
- I thought personification was what religion did, and that this was its great crime. Whatever happened to that?

303. 'They are not to be thought of as elementary particles but as organisms.
- he means their complex ideas, not simple 'ideas' like numbers or colors. (As if those were simple.)

- This is more personification. I think he's been deliberately vague and confusing here; that he wants people to think of memes as living organisms.

303. 'The hula hoop itself is a meme vehicle. So, for that matter, is each human hula hooper—a strikingly effective meme vehicle...'

- This extends Dawkins' metaphor of the selfish gene; the model of man as a gene vehicle. ie. as man carries genes, he carries memes. As he's a plaything of some genes, he's a plaything of some memes. Man has been 'dethroned' by the gene and the meme. The lesser has become the greater. This is a dismissal of the idea of responsibility. Dawkins is trying to defend materialism by doing away with morality; as morality makes no sense in a materialist universe. In this model, man is a helpless victim of his genes. (He's a gene/meme machine I guess.) The christian critique of materialism has been that it has no basis for giving men a moral code. Dawkins deals with this critique by denying man is a morally responsible creature. Being a robot slave of selfish genes man doesn't need a moral code; such a code makes no sense since man has no free will, and can only do as the genes command.

304. “A wagon with spoked wheels carries not only grain or freight from place to place; it carries the brilliant idea of a wagon with spoked wheels from mind to mind.”- Daniel Dennett 'Hula hoopers did that for the hula hoop’s memes...'

- A wagon doesn't carry an idea. One might say it's an embodiment of an idea, but without a human being to see it, and to comprehend it, it's nothing.

G. speaks of as the hula hoop were a person, a person that possessed memes.
To say lula hoopers did something for the hula hoop meme is utterly nonsensical. This isn't science. This is a rhetorical interpretation of the data; it's nothing but spin. No one observes this. They observe hula hoops, and people using hula hoops. That's empirical descriptive science. The rest is spin; metaphysical speculation.

304. 'The meme is not the dancer but the dance

- Is that a scientific claim? I wonder if it's testable.

304. 'We are their vehicles and their enablers.

- We are their vehicles he tells us.
I almost wish I was making this stuff up, but I'm not. (The book I've enjoyed so much is transforming itself into some Lovecraft horror tale.) This is more from the new death of man theology. (e.g. you've no doubt read the claim man is just a bag of chemicals.) Dawkins is the high priest of this new religion, and apparently Gleick is an acolyte.

305. 'Memes may be stories, recipes, skills, legends, and fashions. We copy them, one person at a time. Alternatively, in Dawkins’s meme-centered perspective, they copy themselves.

- They copy themselves? This is an example of what we call the pathetic fallacy.

305. For Dawkins; 'selfishness is defined by the geneticist as the tendency to increase one’s chances of survival relative to its competitors.

- This is typical Dawkins; redefining concepts in a Richard friendly manner. i.e.winning the debate via definition. (He's responding to the criticism genes can't be selfish.) Selfishness has been turned from immoral human behavior (condemned by Christianity) into a amoral survival project. As usual his goal is to promote materialism. i.e. morals, not being physical, aren't real; therefore they're redefined as instincts or programs. His 'science' is teleological. The goal of all his 'scientific' writing is the promotion and defense of materialism. He turns everything to this end; even if it means badly distorting the data, inventing metaphors, or turning basic science upside down. He allows nothing to get in the way of the project.

305. 'Dawkins’s way of speaking was not meant to suggest that memes are conscious actors, only that they are entities with interests that can be furthered by natural selection. Their interests are not our interests.

- Only people have interests, and 'memes' aren't persons. To speak of 'natural selection' in this context is a travesty of real science. Natural selection is an undirected process of species conservation. To equate NS with the process of human idea transmission is ludicrous. You're comparing an undirected process to human beings. This is a wild category mistake. This is making nonsense of the English language.

To equate our interests with the 'interests' of memes is buffoonery. These people have reified an abstraction (or metaphor) and are acting as if it's alive and has personality. We need to ask if this has anything to do with science. (Is reification good science? is it good method?)

305. 'When we speak of fighting for a principle or dying for an idea, we may be more literal than we know.

- People aren't (as far as I'm aware) being literal when they say they're fighting for an idea. Good grief! What this means is they're willing to die for the embodiment of an idea; the idea as it's been expressed in society, in their homeland. It's means they're willing to die for the people who live according to the idea. I have no idea how Gleick can be so thick. (I've said it before; materialism destroys the mind... it renders people idiotic in their propositions.)

Notes;
1. The Information - James Gleick/301.
2. 'Personification is an ontological metaphor in which a thing or abstraction is represented as a person.[1]
The term "personification" may apply to:
* A description of an object as being a living person or animal as in: "The sun shone brightly down on me as if she were shining for me alone". In this example the sun is depicted as if capable of intent, and is referenced with the pronoun "she" rather than "it".
* An outstanding example of a quality or idea: "He's invisible, a walking personification of the Negative" (Ralph Ellison).
- remind you of anyone :=}
- someone ought to tell Dawkins and his fan club that memes are an it not a he or she; that they're objects not persons.
Examples;
# Father Time
# Mother Nature
- Another example is natural selection; the 'tinker' who hobbles together the hodgepodge machinery we call a human being.
3. 'The pathetic fallacy or anthropomorphic fallacy is the treatment of inanimate objects as if they had human feelings, thought, or sensations.[1] The pathetic fallacy is a special case of the fallacy of reification. The word 'pathetic' in this use is related to 'pathos' or 'empathy' (capability of feeling), and is not pejorative.
- to treat ideas (memes) as alive and living is an example of the pathetic fallacy. (This is not exactly considered good science... or it wasn't at one time.)

The Invasion of the replicators

2011-04-27T13:52:00.000-07:00

Although I think Gleick's book [The Information] is informative, and well worth reading, I have problems with the approach he decided to take. When discussing the origin of life on earth he ignores the seeming unanswerable objections to this happening by some chance accident. I feel he's being dishonest here, as he just pretends it's no big deal. He doesn't even admit no one know how this could have happened. He simply pretends one of the many OOL scenarios is correct. End of story.

I don't feel ignoring problems is a proper way to write science. He just ignores the problem of where all the information (complex, specified) for living organisms came from. I find this odd to say the least, coming in a book about information.

Quotes and comments on 'The Information' by James Gleick;

1. 'The history of life begins with the accidental appearance of molecules complex enough to serve as building blocks—replicators.' [1.]

- Gleick accepts the idea that all life on earth is a chemical accident. Complexity happens by accident in this account. I thought science was supposed to be about finding laws. I don't see how anyone can believe living organisms 'emerged' from inert matter by accident.

He states this as a fact. It's not a fact, it's a story. No one was there. No one can know this. If this passage were written honestly it would read; 'according to the most popular and current neo-darwinian thinking, life began with the accidental appearance...'

The ability to replicate (reproduce) has it's source in random chance and accident in this scenario. This is an amazing miracle if true. Where does the information come from for this astounding ability? There's a great mystery here, and the average e. just skips merrily over it; pretending as if he's explained it, when all he's done is tell us it happened. (Apparently no explanation for this miracle is needed.) What we have here (in this scenario) is the accidental production of a complex molecule; a molecule that contains both information and information on how to replicate. Am I the only one who sees this as impossible? We don't get a hint (in the textbooks) of how this happened. Not a whiff. Writers just pretend it's all a simple matter and an undeniable fact. (Is this a good way to write science?)

Now I assume this mythical molecule contained DNA, so that it could replicate. So where did the DNA come from? Where did the code come from? What wrote the code? You'd think these would be questions that need to be discussed, but no, they're ignored. I guess this is all a rhetorician can do when they can't answer a question. You'd think any writer with integrity would at least admit they have no idea how this could happen, but I guess that's too much to ask in our politicized culture.
- I guess the idea is that some molecule emerged that didn't require DNA to replicate; but this still doesn't explain where DNA came from, where the coding system came from.

Replicate;
1. To reproduce or make an exact copy or copies of (genetic material, a cell, or an organism).

2. 'Replicators could exist long before DNA, even before proteins.' [1.]

- Could they? Is that a fact or another story? I don't see any way this can be proved. Certainly no one saw it.
Can you have proteins without DNA? I thought DNA held the code (instructions) for creating proteins?

The warrant for this 'fact' of evolution is a scenario dreamt up by
Alexander Cairns-Smith. So his story depends for its warrant on another story. Apparently this is how Darwinism works. (It's stories all the way down folks.)

He gives some alternate scenarios and then says 'either way' it all happened. ie. as if one of these stories Has to be true; as if there couldn't be another explanation (ie. ID) The idea one of a collection of scenarios has to be true is a simple fallacy. (Does Gleick not realize this?)
This whole OOL scenario requires huge amounts of complex, specified information, and the materialists never tell us how this information came about. It's a taboo subject apparently. (i.e. ''we know it happened, so it doesn't matter how it happened...")

- That Gleick doesn't deal with the problems in the materialist OOL scenario, makes this a dishonest book. Materialists seem incapable of discussing and admitting the huge holes in their theory. (They're certainly unwilling to do so.) Is this any way to do science? This is taking the coward's way out. ("Mankind cannot bear much reality," the poet said.) We can't answer the critics so let's ban them, we can't answer them so let's pretend they don't exist... pretend we know how it happened, pretend it's an undeniable fact, pretend we're doing science and not just inventing stories. ("I am the great pretender, pretending that I'm doing well...") This is sad, stuff. Why is it these people can't be honest? Are they going to go to their graves telling these lies, never admitting the truth?

3. 'The body is a colony of genes.' [2.]

- Is it? This is the chicken and the egg story again. [5.] This isn't a fact, it's an interpretation... a way of looking at things. In my opinion it's simply false to say the body is a colony of genes. Even for an evolutionist it's obvious the animal is also a single unit... so it's simply a fallacy to say it IS a colony of genes. This claim is a denial of creation, where an animal is seen as having been designed.

E. theory claims body plans (different creatures) are accidental assemblages of once independent organisms... that somehow managed to find a way to work together. (God knows how; but we're certain it happened this way.) What the heart was before various parts came together (at some kind of heart conference I guess) I'd like to know. I find the idea the various organ systems in the body came together by chemical accident comical.

The above is not a scientific statement. (This is surprising for someone who's devoted themselves to writing on science.) We don't observe that a body is a colony of genes. What we observe, what the data consists of, are genes within the cell, within the body. The word 'is' in this sentence has nothing to do with empirical science. We don't see the 'is' part of this statement. The 'is' part is interpretation, and not scientific.

He talks as if genes were once independent organisms. I see no evidence for this. What we see today is that genes are never independent. I don't see any reason to believe things were ever any different. I believe genes were always dependent (body inhabiting) entities. I believe they were part of the original design of the original creation. ie. that animal kinds were created with genes (DNA) already intact. I can't prove it, but it's the only explanation that makes sense to me.

4. “Selection favors those genes which succeed in the presence of other genes,” says Dawkins, “which in turn succeed in the presence of them." [3.]

- More nonsense from the grandfather of personification. The word favors in this statement has no scientific content. What we observe is that some genes succeed. That's all the data that's here. The rest is Darwinian spin.

There is no entity called selection, and there is no 'favoring' going on. Selection has been reified and given a magic wand. This is not empirical science. (For someone who claims to be defending 'true' science against creationist non-science; Dawkins cares little for being empirical, to restricting himself to actual observation. Most of his writing isn't scientific at all; it's merely a Darwinian spin on things.
e.g. To claim man is a robot slave of genes isn't remotely scientific. In fact it's anti-scientific. That's not an observation, but a Darwinian interpretation.

5. 'To say that a replicator manages to survive for eons is to define the replicator as all the copies considered as one. Thus the gene does not “grow senile,” Dawkins declared.
"It is no more likely to die when it is a million years old than when it is only a hundred. It leaps from body to body down the generations, manipulating body after body in its own way and for its own ends, abandoning a succession of mortal bodies before they sink in senility and death. [4.]

- This is fantasy, not science. No one observes this. Isn't science supposed to be about observation? He's merely defined his 'master of survival' gene into existence. It has no existence outside his definition.

This is gross personification... really ugly stuff. A gene leaping from body to body; a gene with goals or ends. Pure piffle; nothing but Darwinian storytelling.

6. 'This is where life breaks free from its material moorings. (Unless you already believed in the immortal soul.) The gene is not an information-carrying macromolecule. The gene is the information. [4.]

- This is what the materialist has to say isn't it? This is the only way he can deal with information within a materialist system. Since m. claims that only the physical is real (and part of science) he must claim information is physical, not immaterial. What Dawkins is doing with his fairy story is trying to save materialism (i.e. from the new threat of information theory). As always, his goal in 'science' is to defend atheism.

To do so he concocts a view of information that goes counter to all other views. His view of information isn't remotely scientific. He's not trying to understand the universe; he's trying to defend materialism. (I guess we could say that Richard Dawkins is atheism's way of preserving itself :=}

I have no idea how a materialist can claim 'life' (a reification) breaks free from its material moorings. That makes no sense to me. That's incoherent as far as I'm concerned.

7. 'The physicist Max Delbrück wrote in 1949, “Today the tendency is to say ‘genes are just molecules, or hereditary particles,’ and thus to do away with the abstractions.” Now the abstractions returned. [4.]

- Abstractions aren't physical are they? Therefore (according to classical materialism) they can't be a subject of science. So we have the comical spectacle of Dawkins defending materialism by the use of abstractions (reifications, personifications, etc.).

8. 'The quavers and crotchets inked on paper are not the music. Music is not a series of pressure waves sounding through the air; nor grooves etched in vinyl or pits burned in CDs; nor even the neuronal symphonies stirred up in the brain of the listener. The music is the information. [4.]

- Really? I don't think so. Music isn't any one of these things, it's all of them. It's reductionistic and fallacious to say music IS the information. That's certainly not a scientific view. It's a limited and partial interpretation of music.
If you're going to say this about music, you'll have to say it about everything. You'll end up saying the world is information; the universe is information. Everything is information. This is a fallacy. You can't equate the universe with the information embedded in it. Life isn't that simple. The universe exists on many levels. There's the physical level, the level of energy, the level of information, the conscious level, the unconscious level, the microscopic level, the macroscopic level, the animal level, the human level, and so on.

If everything is information, then you have to say the universe consists of information replicating itself. This is a profoundly anti-human way of thinking. This is reductionism with a vengence.

Summary;
- If you know what Dawkins' goal is (to defend materialism) you can have a good idea what his take will be on any idea. It will be the take (spin) that best defends materialism. What he's done in his career is take the classic evidence for theism and try to formulate accounts of this evidence that make sense in terms of materialism.
e.g. take the subject of design; he defends materialism by saying what creationists think is design is merely the appearance of design. This isn't a scientific observation but merely a piece of rhetoric. (Something he's adept at.) You can't disprove his interpretation (at least not easily) and so he has what he considers a plausible account of design that defends materialism. (i.e. What appears to be design is simply the mechanical working out of natural selection.) He takes the concept of a (creative) natural selection from Darwin, and adds his bit of rhetoric to the mix.

These mythical replicators are more like the aliens in SF than they are real. They're products of the same culture specific imagination. The same kind of people who invent aliens invent replicators. There's a similar lack of rigor involved, a similar soaring on the wings of unfettered imagination. They invaded the earth and left behind a brood of monsters; monsters who have turned mankind into robot slaves. (So sayeth Richard Dawkins.)

Mike Johnson [frfarer at gmail.com]

Notes;
1. The Information - James Gleick/p.294
2. p.295
3. p. 296
4. p. 298
5. According to Samuel Butler, a chicken is an egg's way of producing an egg.
6. I haven't finished the book so maybe he does address this issue later, but he should have addressed it in this section on Origins.
- There is quite a long list of materialists (within the scientific community) that have admitted that the origin of life remains a mystery, so Gleick can't claim he had no one he could quote.
7. I take the view genes don't propagate, organisms propagate. (You can't propagate if you don't have propagating equipment, can you :=} Neither this view, nor the view Dawkins espouses is strictly empirical, although mine is the more natural, the more intuitive.
8. When I'm talking of genes I'm referring to the human genes; the genes in the human genome.

Richard Dawkins stands on his head

2011-04-26T12:06:00.000-07:00

Some more comments on 'The Information' by James Gleick. I want to deal with the idea of the selfish gene. Standing on his head, Dawkins imagines he's the only one who sees life in the correct way.

Quotes and comments;

1. 'We use DNA, just as we use lungs to breathe and eyes to see. We use it. “This attitude is an error of great profundity,”Dawkins wrote. “It is the truth turned crashingly on its head.” DNA came first—by billions of years—and DNA comes first, he argued, when life is viewed from the proper perspective." [1.]

- If all is matter in motion nothing can be an error of great profundity; nothing can be profound at all.
Dawkins claims DNA came first. This isn't a fact, this is a bit of theory; a bit of a theory if you will. No one observed this. The fact it's impossible for matter to write code apparently doesn't bother him.

His point is that DNA uses us. This makes no sense to me. The lesser doesn't use the greater. DNA makes no sense without living organisms; that's what it's for, for goodness sake. You don't say the saw uses the carpenter! i.e. we are the slaves of DNA because DNA came first. This isnt a scientific argument, nor is it a logical one. He can offer no proof of his idea. The idea is untestable speculation; a bit of metaphysics.

Truth? If all is matter in motion there is no truth. If DNA is the 'boss' and we have to look at ourselves in that light it makes no sense to speak of the truth. Truth is a human concept, not a 'concept' of DNA. There is no 'truth' in DNA... so why speak of truth then?

Proper perspective? How does he know what that is? That's another human concept by the way. There is no 'proper perspective' seen from the 'vantage point' of dna. Nothing is proper or improper to DNA. (Apparently dawkins had to stand on his head to see things in the proper perspective.)

2. "From that perspective [above], genes are the focus, the sine qua non, the star of the show." [1.]

- This is the idea instructions exist for themselves! This is akin to saying a blueprint for a house exists for itself, and not to build a house with. How Dawkins can get things so wrong is amazing. The man goes through life standing on his head.

3. 'In his first book—published in 1976, meant for a broad audience, provocatively titled The Selfish Gene—he set off decades of debate by declaring: “We are survival machines—robot vehicles blindly programmed to preserve the selfish molecules known as genes.” [2.]

- If that's the case why do they need us?
If they (genes, DNA segments) existed for billions of years without us, why do they need us, why do we exist? It makes no sense to me. If genes existed before any animal why do they even need bugs or insects? This is a completely irrational notion.

How do molecules program creatures? This is an absurd use of language. Only intelligent agents write programs. His claim isn't scientific. It's not even science fiction; it's more deserving a place in the horror genre.

Why would a molecule care if it survives or not? Could it? How?

Blindly programmed? What's that when it's at home? Do people write code blind? Can code be written blind? (i.e. without intention, without a goal)

4. "'Genes, not organisms, are the true units of natural selection. They began as “replicators”—molecules formed accidentally in the primordial soup, with the unusual property of making copies of themselves." [2.]

- How anyone can believe this I don't know. Anything's possible in Dawkin's world I guess. (That no-god zone of his perverse imagination.)

Has he forgotten what genes are? Has he forgotten their usual definition?
Gene;
1. 'A hereditary unit consisting of a sequence of DNA that occupies a specific location on a chromosome and determines a particular characteristic in an organism. [AHD]

5. "They are past masters of the survival arts. But do not look for them floating loose in the sea; they gave up that cavalier freedom long ago." [2.]

- How's that for purple prose? Doesn't exactly sound scientific does it. Dawkins is engaging in personification (anthropomorphism) here. Again; why use this human language to describe the non-human?

Cavalier freedom? Come on. That's a bit rich even for Dawkins. What can it possibly mean? (Not that it isn't a scientific fact :=}

Cavalier; [from Cavaliers]
a. Showing arrogant or offhand disregard; dismissive

- Genes can be arrogant Richard? Did you see that through a microscope?
A cavalier was a soldier or a knight (a chivalrous man one dictionary says) How does this fit in with genes?

Cavalier freedom is such a strange conjunction... I'm not sure it makes any sense at all. A soldier isn't notable for having freedom.
Why would genes give up their freedom? (Assuming matter in motion can have freedom, or that it makes any sense in a non-human context.) How does he know this is what happened? I don't think he has a time machine.

What instructions did these mythical genes have any way? (Does he ever tell us this?) A gene to be a gene has to consist of instructions does it not? Or didn't these cavalier genes have instructions in those free and easy days? Why would they carry instructions they weren't going to use? why would they have instructions to compose other creatures?
- Could such a hypothetical creature even exist independently? I don't see how.

6. ''Now they swarm in huge colonies, safe inside gigantic lumbering robots, sealed off from the outside world, communicating with it by tortuous indirect routes, manipulating it by remote control."

- This sounds like something out of 'Astounding Stories' circa 1940. These 'genes' of his sound almost identical to some pulp descriptions of invading aliens.
Safe? Why weren't they safe before this? If they survived billions of years on their own they must have been pretty safe. Wouldn't they be safer in a world by themselves? Why bring in the danger of other creatures.

This isn't science it's twaddle; metaphysical speculation (of an extremely perverse sort).
How can a molecule communicate? Does it speak English or French? What does it mean to say a molecule communicates? Communicates what? Does oxygen have anything to say. ("If only the elements could speak! What tales they'd tell.")

Why did they create such torture for themselves? What does torture mean when applied to a molecule?

7. "They are in you and in me; they created us, body and mind; and their preservation is the ultimate rationale for our existence...'' [2.]

- This is crackpot theology, not science. If his scenario were true nothing would have a rationale. An entity that's not rational can't have a reason for anything. Without intelligence reason cannot exist.
This reductionism turned into a crackpot religion.

They? Doesn't he mean it? If he changed his purple pen for a grey one this would read; 'The gene is in you and me; it created us, body and mind...' It would still be nonsense, but a little higher class nonsense; having made the move from genre to literature as it were.

Let's see now. A molecule created the mind. I see... but wait; I thought materialists believe only the physical exists. He must mean a molecule created the human brain. That Is impressive isn't it? I wonder where a gene got the information from. Maybe there's a cosmic library that your average molecule can tap into.

8. 'Yet Dawkins’s book was brilliant and transformative. It established a new, multilayered understanding of the gene. At first, the idea of the selfish gene seemed like a trick of perspective, or a joke. Samuel Butler had said a century earlier—and did not claim to be the first—that a hen is only an egg’s way of making another egg.'

- The selfish gene idea Is a joke. It's a joke and nothing more. (A very bad joke; a joke in very bad taste.) It wouldn't surprise me if he came up with the idea as a joke. (It would seem there has to be some reason for him to choose to see things in such a upside down fashion.) It would fit with his unflagging attempts to defame God, Christianity and creation. If he's correct, life is a bad joke... and if there's a god, it's he who has perpetrated this bad joke on us.

Summary;
The selfish gene idea isn't science. It's a bit of rhetoric that tries to convince people that everything the bible tells them about metaphysics is false.

Mike Johnson

Notes;
1. The Information - James Gleick/291
2. ibid; page 292
3. Where's the proof a molecule has a will to survive? Where's the proof this is possible? How is it a molecule can have a will? This is equivocation at best. A molecule is deaf, dumb and blind, and has no mind... but Rich Dawkins seems not to know this.
4. I could play the Dawkins game (really the Butler game) and say Richard Dawkins is just the devil's way of slandering God.
5. The egg story is a good example of how the data and the story are not the same. Stories are interpretations of data. Theoretically there could be an almost limitless number of stories told about a set of data. eg. e.s like to say the fossil record proves evolution over time. It's simply a fact they say. This isn't true. The fossil record composes a set of data, while the idea this proves e. over time is an interpretation of the data. It's not the only interpretation out there, or the only one possible. This interpretation is as impossible to prove as Butler's story of the egg. We're talking about something we didn't observe.
6. DNA creates the cell, but needs the cell to exist... there can be no cell without DNA, but there can be no dna without the cell. More evidence for special creation.
7. Interpretation; or The story of the chicken and the egg
- Samuel butler said the chicken was the egg's way of producing an egg. His views on the egg are just as scientific as Dawkins' ideas on the selfish gene. i.e. neither is scientific.
What we observe is sperm and egg coming together and an egg being formed, and the egg coming out of the chicken. That's science; anything else is spin... story telling.
8. Speaking of eggs; the fact no one can answer the riddle which came first is (I believe) evidence for special creation. I see no other possible explanation. The evolutionist in my opinion, has no grounds for throwing out the best (only) explanation.
- the Biblical answer is that the chicken came first. i.e. special creation

A preposterous universe

2011-04-25T15:16:00.000-07:00

Some more comments on the book 'The Information' by James Gleick. (I recommend it to everyone.)

Quotes and comments;

1. 'By now the word code was so deeply embedded in the conversation that people seldom paused to notice how extraordinary it was to find such a thing—abstract symbols representing arbitrarily different abstract symbols—at work in chemistry, at the level of molecules. [1.]

- Apparently people still don't realize how 'extraordinary' this is. i.e. it's 'extra' ordinary, in the sense of being outside the ordinary realm. We might say it's meta-ordinary; which is to say beyond natural, which is to say supra-natural. (Not in the sense of being, necessarily, divine, but in the sense of being beyond the merely physical.... meaning when we look at DNA we're looking at intelligence.)

Here we have people admitting they've discovered something extraordinary... but don't even contemplate giving the subject serious thought. Their m. convictions are so firm that they refuse to consider the extraordinary implications of what they're looking at. They say they want a sign from God, but when they get one they deny it.

If all is matter plus physics how can anything be outside the normal order of things? Aren't physical laws supposed to be common and universal? How then can you get 'uncommon' results? How can there be any exceptions to the rules? (i.e. creating code is most especially NOT what chemicals do. How can there be a remarkable exception to the ordinary way they react?) Genetic code was both extraordinary and unexpected.

2. 'So DNA not only replicates itself; separately, it dictates the manufacture of something entirely different. [2.]

- That the information for X existed before X, is preposterous isn't it? Indeed it's so preposterous the materialist can't explain it.
Information comes first; it had to. The materialist contends that organisms came first and then information somehow evolved from them. The creationist contends that information came first, and from it organisms were created. The materialist has things backward. (He's got the cart before the horse as the old saying goes.)

Notes;
1. The Information - James Gleick p.285
2. Gleick/286
3. Extraordinary;
- early 15c., from L. extraordinarius "out of the common order," from extra ordinem "out of order," especially the usual order, from extra "out" (see extra-) + ordinem (nom. ordo) "order" (see order).
Extraordinary;
a. 'Beyond what is ordinary or usual:
b. Highly exceptional
c. Being beyond or out of the common order or rule; not of the usual, customary, or regular kind; not ordinary
d. Exceeding the common degree, measure. or condition
e. Employed or sent upon an unusual or special service
- There has to be a special agent to create something special. i.e. life forms on the earth. Mere physical laws won't do the trick. Everyone agrees that we need code; but the materialist has no explanation for this extraordinary entity (i.e. DNA)
f. Far more than usual or expected.
4. Synonyms;
Unusual, singular, extra, unwonted, signal, egregious, marvelous, prodigious, strange, preposterous.
- I find the idea chemicals can formulate code a preposterous idea :=}
5. Preposterous;
1540s, from L. praeposterus "absurd, contrary to nature," lit. "before-behind" (cf. topsy-turvy, cart before the horse), from prae "before" + posterus "subsequent."
a. Contrary to nature, reason, or common sense;
- DNA is indeed contrary to nature (if we define nature as inert matter) We live in a preposterous universe in a sense.
6. 'The genetic code performed a function with uncanny similarities to the metamathematical code invented by Gödel for his philosophical purposes. - Gleick/285
- I think this deserves the name extraordinary :=}
- How could this be the product of mere matter in motion? Are the people who claim this being serious? (I know they pull long faces, and try to Look serious, when they make the claim, but can they really believe that DNA is a chemical accident?)
7. “Nobody had ever in the least suspected that one set of chemicals could code for another set,” Hofstadter wrote.
"Indeed, the very idea is somewhat baffling: If there is a code, then who invented it? What kinds of messages are written in it? Who writes them? Who reads them?" - Gleick/285
- Given this quote, what right has anyone got to mock ID? Why is it okay for Hofstadter to write like this, but not Stephen Meyer?

A voice in the void

2011-04-24T14:11:00.000-07:00

I want to post a few comments on an excellent lecture by John Lennox. (A matter of gravity) It's a response to the new book by Stephen Hawking; Grand Design, and is available online. [see notes]

Quotes and comments;

1. "Because there is a law of gravity the universe will create itself out of nothing." - Hawking [1.]
- And where did gravity come from? Did it birth itself? Doesn't there have to be a universe for there to be gravity?

2. Hawking declares philosophy to be dead (echoing Nietzsche, and his claim god is dead).
- I see this as evidence for Van Til's claim that the death of god is the death of rationality. i.e. of truth, objectivity, etc.
- as Lennox notes; this statement by Hawking, is itself a philosophical statement.

3. The idea the universe created itself is as nonsensical as me saying that I created myself.

4. Hawking claims universes (plural) arise from laws; but there can be no laws if nothing exists. He reifies law; law isn't a entity in itself; it's merely a description of what we see going on in the universe. It's too bad he thinks philosophy is dead; because he could learn something by studying it. He's making concrete what is an abstraction. There is no law over and above what is going on. Laws are descriptive not presciptive. What is a law if nothing exists? His view can only mean that laws exist independent of the universe... and this is a fallacy.

5. Lennox tells us that a scientist can describe how a jet engine works; but cannot account for how it came into being....
- Certainly the law of gravity didn't create the engine. But if you're a materialist this is what you'd have to say if you wanted to be consistent. (Being consistent is something no unregenerate person wants to do.)

6. H. when asked where gravity came from said, "M theory"

- In my view, this isn't, and cannot be science. Cosmologists like Hawking have abandoned empirical science. That he knows his math doesn't mean he's not a quack. There is No way he can know the things he claims to know.
In his delusions of grandeur he's confusing his speculations with reality. As Lennox points out a theory can't create anything. These guys have been smoking the materialist pipe so long they're high on the fumes... and have left the real world behind. This isn't science... it's science fiction (of a very boring sort.)

7. H. claims to know there are many universes. I find this comical arrogance. No one can know this. Once upon a time universe meant all that exists. If we take that definition there can't be many universes. (I notice that they never tell us how many universes! If it's all simply a matter of doing the math, why is it they don't know how many universes there are?)

I consider this burlesque; not science. Whatever happened to empirical science? As you can accomplish anything with statistics, so you can do anything with equations and mathematics. (Is H. aware, I'm sure he is, that many mathematicians consider math to be a human invention. If it is, it couldn't prove anything about the universe.)

8. An investigation of the physical universe can never disprove God; this is a juvenile idea. (Try reading a little philosophy Stephen) This is like saying if I study a jet engine, and don't see its human inventor residing inside of it, said person doesn't exist.

9. Some people claim that are an infinite amount of universes. How could they know? How can the infinite exist? An infinite number of universes came from nothing? We're a million light years past silly here :=} God is an impossiblity according to Michael Martin, but an infinite number of universes aren't?
If given an infinite number of universes anything can happen, why is it our universe could not have been created by god? His argument refutes itself.

10. H. claims that 'science' has killed philsophy (as it's killed god) One wonders what it will kill next. (Echoes of here of Fred Saberhagen's Berserkers?)

11. Roger Penrose has said the mulitverse idea is an excuse for not having a good idea (ie. why there is something rather than nothing; why the universe is so exquisitely fine tuned.)

12. "Free will is an illusion.'' - Hawking
- if that's the case why is he trying to persuade us of his views?

13. Lennox tells us many (including the editor of Nature) opposed the idea of the big bang when it came out. Why? Because it 'supported' the biblical view of a creation in time.

14. Since he accepts the idea of Evolution, I wonder if H. is aware of the creationist claim that matter (or the laws of physics if he prefers) cannot produce genetic code. Imagine looking at a computer and saying ''look, the laws of physics produced this thing... aren't the laws of physics incredible?"

If all is physical law, then his own book is a product of physics. His divorce from his first wife was a matter of gravity. Does he believe that?

To say something was created by the laws of science' (e.g. the universe) makes no sense to me. Did the 'laws of science' create the model T?

15. To say that 'science' can answer every question is to claim every answer boils down to physics, that everything can be understood in terms of matter in motion. This is nothing more than comical bravado.

Notes;
1. A matter of gravity - John Lennox [YouTube]
- His lecture is much better than my rough notes make it appear. Don't waste your time here; go straight to the lecture.
2. Ravi Zacharias Answers Stephen Hawking - Part 1 [of 3] YouTube
- Ravi Z. in conversation with John Lennox

Sending out an S.O.S.

2011-04-23T11:09:00.000-07:00

I've been reading 'The Information' by James Gleick, and I want to make a few comments on a particular passage. (Fascinating book by the way.)

Quotes and comments;

1. 'His colleague Sidney Dancoff suggested to him in 1950 that a chromosomal thread is “a linear coded tape of information;
"The entire thread constitutes a “message.” This message can be broken down into sub-units which may be called “paragraphs,” “words,” etc. [1.]

- There are no messages in inert matter. Where do messages come from then? How do you go from no messages to messages? Matter doesn't need messages; nor is it capable of producing them. Even granting it could produce them, why would it produce something it didn't need. Matter has no needs; no desires, no thoughts and no needs.

2. Message;
- c.1300, "communication transmitted via a messenger," from O.Fr. message, from M.L. missaticum, from L. missus, pp. of mittere "to send" (see mission). The Latin word is glossed in O.E. by ærende. Specific religious sense of "divinely inspired communication via a prophet" (1540s) led to transferred sense of "the broad meaning (of something)," first attested 1828. As a verb, "to send messages," attested from 1580s. To get the message "understand" is from 1964.

- What message could matter possibly 'want' to send? how could it have any message. Only living organisms have a need or desire to send a message. Among animals messages are mainly concerned with matters of life and death (and are instinctual). You only desire to send a message if you care about something; i.e. if you care about being alive. Since matter isn't alive it doesn't care about anything, and therefore has no message to send. Matter has no messages, and is incapable of formulating any, or sending any. Matter cannot be the source of messages in the universe.

3. Message;
a. A usually short communication transmitted by words, signals, or other means from one person, station, or group to another.
- Matter doesn't send messages because it has nothing to say; it has nothing to say because it has no personality. Impersonal entities don't send messages. Messages are evidence of personality.

b. The substance of such a communication; the point or points conveyed: gestured to a waiter, who got the message and brought the bill.
- matter doesn't communicate because it has nothing to say; it just is... and that being the case it is silent... or less than silent. It can only dream about being silent :=}
- all true communication is in code. All code must have an author.

c. 'A communication transmitted; a notice sent; information or opinion or advice communicated through a messenger or other agency: as, a verbal or written message; a telegraphic message.

- A message informs, it transfers knowledge. Only living organisms need knowledge. Matter doesn't need knowledge; isn't capable of it, and doesn't even know what it is. Matter doesn't get hungry, and doesn't get lonely. It doesn't need to send out an S.O.S.

The idea that one day the answer will be found is an expression of faith. (It obviously won't be found if it doesn't exist.) One wonders how long the search will go on. (As long as gov. funding holds out I guess.) Evolutionists are spending a lot of money trying to defend their materialist worldview; to at least make it somewhat plausible.

d. 'Any concept or information conveyed by the use of (usually written) symbols. - Wiki

- Mere matter knows nothing of symbols. Only human beings make conscious use of symbols. Symbols require intelligence, personality and necessity. The symbol use we see in DNA could not have had a source in inert matter. It's impossible. Even if it were capable of such a thing, why would matter use symbols? does it have something to hide? something 'ineffable' to express? does it have some message it needs to encode for transmission?

5. Symbol;
- the meaning "something which stands for something else" first recorded 1590 (in "Faerie Queene").
- What could matter stand for (other than itself)? Matter is what it is what it is. If all is matter, what else is there anyway? There are no symbols in a universe of mere matter. Not one.

a. 'Something that represents something else by association, resemblance, or convention, especially a material object used to represent something invisible.

b. 'Any character used to represent a quantity, an operation, a relation, or an abbreviation.
- the symbols used in DNA represent an operation i.e. the instructions that go into producing a protein. (In the realm of mere matter there are no symbols and no instructions. You only have instructions where you have a goal. As far as we know, the only source of goals are intelligent agents.)

The materialist must explain how you can have symbols before intelligence; symbols before persons.

The only way materialists can escape the dilemna posed by information is to equate information with its physical medium. This becomes the claim information is the same as brain cells, or ink on paper, or the same as hard drive it's configured onto. I see this as a ruse that attempts to escape the problem. To a strict materialist information cannot exist (ie. apart from its physical embodiment.) That information exists, is evidence to me that materialism is false.

Summary;
All the materialist can say to this is; ''well; it happened... so there. One day we'll know how this cosmic accident occurred but for now we must keep searching." If that satisfies some people (and apparently it does) what can I say. It doesn't satisfy me. I see the undirected 'emergence of 'life' from inert matter as inherently impossible. In my opinion (limited as it is) it's a desire to believe there is no creator god that prompts people to accept the m. view. If it wasn't for a desire m. be true, I don't think anyone would find the chance production of life forms a believable idea.

The space craft NASA (and Carl Sagan helped design) sent out into the universe to tell the whereabouts of human kind, can be seen as an S.O.S. sent out by materialists... seeking confirmation of their worldview. i.e. send us a message telling us we're right. Please.

We'll go out on a musical note; 'Message in a bottle' - The Police

Notes;
1. The Information - James Gleick/280
- I especially enjoyed the chapter on Charles Babbage and Ada Lovelace. A whole book could be written on their unusual partnership.
2. Title refers to a song by Police [''Message in a bottle'']

Science and sin; or, whatever happened to science?

2011-04-19T09:16:00.001-07:00

A popular book of years ago asked 'whatever happened to sin?" Now we need to ask; whatever happened to science? Scientists have become the great usurpers; they no longer seem to think in terms of limits. They don't seem to know the difference between rocks and people. Reductionism has become imperialism and given us falsehood and misunderstanding. (Empiricism has turned into reductionism; method has become worldview.) The idea matter is all there is, isn't an empirical observation, it's a philosophical claim. The idea reductionism can explain all things isn't empirical or scientific, but philosophical.

Quotes and comments;
1. '...McMaster University researchers decided they would find “scientific solutions to sin.” Is their solution theological? Are they suggesting moral teachings, or offering psychological counseling? No; their working assumption is that all sin has molecular underpinnings.
"Most people are familiar with the seven deadly sins – pride, envy, gluttony, lust, wrath, greed and sloth – but could there be molecular solutions for this daily struggle between good and evil?" By getting students to think outside the box, the aim was to come up with the best molecule and design for a drug, or remedy, that counteracts sin.' [1.]

- This is more academic game playing and silliness. What's their definition of sin? Does it exist? (some say no) How can we know? How can we know what it is? How can we know we're right? Is sin one thing or many things?

Why are materialists accepting the Catholic church's definition of sin? Seems a tad odd doesn't it?

The pretense behind this project is the idea all problems have technical solutions; that since all is matter in motion, all problems have material solutions. (ie. man as a bag of chemicals.)

2. Definition of sin;
1. 'A transgression of a religious or moral law, especially when deliberate. [modern]
2. Any want of conformity unto or transgression of the law of God. (Westminster Assembly's Shorter Catechism.)

- If there is no creator god there can be no sin in the biblical sense. So why do materialists need a remedy for sin, when sin doesn't exist? There can be no sin unless there are moral absolutes. It makes no sense for materialists to speak of sin. Their worldview, if it were to be consistent, would not contain sin.

Sin depends on a certain freedom of will. So does man have free will? The materialist to be consistent must say no. Again, to talk of sin makes no sense. (This would be a big problem if materialists were to take philosophy and consistentcy seriously... but of course they don't.)

If man is just an animal (as the judge in the Dover case insisted) then it makes no sense to speak of sin. Do animals sin? Again, the materialist can't be consistent. He must speak out of all orifices at the same time... with each giving a diffeerent message.

The key question here is who defines what is sin? The PC agenda insists that only our secular professors have the right to define sin. They also have the right to have the State enforce their (finite, fallible, fallen) views on the general populace. Is that a scientific idea? Was it discovered with one of the new powerful microscopes? Was it discovered in a Hadron Collider experiment?

What's at stake here is a view of man. My concern is that the PC crowd will define what a 'proper' person is, and then the scientists will be given the job of producing this person. They might use drugs, or they might use genetic engineering. (PC man is coming to a town near you folks. In fact he might already arrived; e.g. 40 percent of people living in montreal are on anti-depressants... or so I remember reading.)

So what happens to science without a sense of sin? Materialism can't offer anything but an arbitrary definition, and science can't offer any definition at all. Scientific enterprise is thus dependent upon non-scientific sources for its moral and ethical directives and ideals. This means that at bottom science is a moral enterprise; that it must have a moral foundation. If man is just a bucket of chemicals in a meaningless universe, it makes no sense to insist he must behave in a certain way. Ethics and morality aren't scientific, and they never can be.

Mike Johnson

Notes;
1. The science of sin; Creation/Evolution Headlines

Knowledge, and the contradictions of Materialism

2011-04-17T12:07:00.000-07:00

The irony of the assault on Christianity by the new atheists is that they have no epistemological foundation for their various critiques.

Quotes and comments;

1. 'To reason at all, the unbeliever must operate on assumptions that actually contradict his espoused presupposition - assumptions that comport only with the Christian worldview.' [1.]

- The materialist must use a Christian metaphysics to be able to reason, even to be able to voice criticisms of Christianity. He must assume he's capable of knowledge, that true knowledge exists, that truth exists, that good and bad, right and wrong exist, that evil exists, etc. Thus at the heart of the 'new atheism' is hypocrisy and contradiction.

For man to possess true knowledge, true knowledge must first exist. The materialist position makes true knowledge impossible. The reductionism inherent in materialism reduces all data into matter in motion. i.e. to physics. This destroys any possibility of rationality or meaning. [2.]

For man to possess true knowledge, he must be a creature capable of acquiring knowledge. The problem of the materialist is that (in terms of his own position) he is decidedly not an entity (organism) capable of knowledge. Materialists characterize man (homo sapien, sapien) in different (various) ways. For some man is just a meat machine; for some he's a bag of chemicals, he's mere matter; he's a 'souped up' (customized) ape; he's a robot being manipulated by his selfish genes; or he's an instinct driven animal.

It's difficult to deal with such a plethora of depictions. It's hard to summarize all these views. What they have in common is a rejection of the biblical portrait of man. Leaving such difficulties aside, we see that there isn't a basis for knowledge in any of these materialist views of man. This is the hopeless position of the materialist. He has no epistemological foundation for knowledge. When he claims to possess true knowelge he's not merely staning on a cloud, the cloud is floating in the void.

Remember this the next time Richard Dawkins gets up on his hind legs and starts spouting off against the 'evils' of Christianity - and gives you the 'truth' about origins. He makes the most foolish child look wise. Everything he says is contradicted by his own basic assumptions of who he is. If he's as wise as he imagines he is, why don't the various components of his worldview comport with each other?

e.g. He says man has no free will, but yet he encourages people to give up their belief in God and creation. This makes no sense. (Aren't ones views supposed to make sense?) Isn't science supposed to be about making sense? Is he so dull of wit (like an axe left for years under a tree) he sees no problem? Is it okay in science to ignore contradictions? Is it okay not to have any epistemological foundation for what you say?

Notes;
1. Van Til's Apologetic - Greg Bahnsen/p. 12
2. 'Van Til asks what view of man, mind, truth, language and the world is necessarily presupposed by our conception of knowledge and our methods of pursuing it." [p.6]

Naturalism and the undertaker; a tale of a hundred moons

2011-04-15T14:22:00.000-07:00

I want to make a few comments that were provoked by reading a review of a book by John Lennox. (God's Undertaker; has science buried God?)

Quotes and comments;

1. ''The standard atheist or materialist position is that nature, the cosmos, or the physical world, is all there is. If nature is all there is (the philosophy of naturalism4), then science is the ultimate source of knowledge (a doctrine that has been called scientism). [1.]

- If nature is all there is, it should be possible to demonstrate how matter, plus physics, plus time can bring about the 'emergence' of living organisms and the eventual flowering of planet earth. The project so far, in my hopefully humble opinion, has been an utter failure. All we've been given is SF style speculation.... (without the humor or the drama.)

If naturalism were correct you would think people could point to some law that would bring living forms out of the void of inert matter... but I see no such law. Physical laws aren't creative; they're reactive. (We might be better off speaking of physical reactions rather than physical laws.) The reactions of matter aren't creative in the sense that they do the same thing every time; e.g. A+B = C (every time) The question materialists are struggling with is how do you get something new out of this? how do you get new answers (information) out of the same old equations? Aren't two and two always going to be four? I don't see any way matter can do any more than give you matter. Matter plus matter = matter. Matter times matter = matter. Matter divided by matter = matter.
Information isn't material, but yet it's what matter needs to create. The materialist is committed to the idea matter can provide information. I don't see it. Matter is a dull witted sort of fellow; he has no tricks up his sleeve... certainly nothing as grand as the specified complexity of genetic code.

2. ''He points out that “the statement that only science can lead to truth is not itself deduced from science” (p. 42), which means that as a matter of logic, scientism has to be false in order to be true.

3. 'It was the deification of nature itself that had the most detrimental effects on science, and it was the Hebraic, biblical doctrine of creation that de-deified nature and made real science possible (pp. 47–50). But, in a sense, nature is being deified again by the claims that the natural world is all there is, and this is again destructive.'

- To say that 'nature' is all there is, is to make nature the most important thing in the universe. It's to make living organisms the most important things in the universe, and ultimately it's to make man the most important (smartest, most powerful, etc.) entity in the universe. Naturalism therefore is a glorification of man. It actually transforms man into God. (ie. since man is the most important being, his views and desires are the ultimate authority in the universe... and that sounds nearly identical to what scripture tells us of God.)

To say there is no god is to say man is god. (No wonder so many people find naturalism attractive.) There are profound theological implications of adopting naturalism as a worldview. It's the most arrogant view that it's possible for a human being to take. To say nature is all there is, is to say all that matters (in the universe) is what man thinks.

I see evidence that some people are troubled by the implications of naturalism in the search for extraterrestrial intelligence. Materialists are seeking an Other as a way of discouraging the hubris inherent in naturalism. (Man wants to be god, but yet finds the prospect troubling.) The biblical view is that man needs God a lot more than he needs aliens. (I don't think human kind needs aliens at all.) Even if aliens were found they could not be the 'significant Other' that man needs. Humanity doesn't need a friend (or a foe) it needs a source of Truth.

4. 'Why are we able to understand and study the universe? Why does mathematics relate to the physical world?
“It is very striking that the most abstract mathematical concepts that seem to be pure inventions of the human mind can turn out to be of vital importance for branches of science, with a vast range of practical applications” (p. 60).

- The biblical answer to this question (why mathematics relates to the physical universe) is basic; the universe was created with man in mind. The universe and man were made to be a perfect fit for each other. (I don't believe that man's physical size is an accident, nor do I think the size of man's mind is an accident. Man's mind is 'big' enough to deal with a universe as large as the one we find ourselves in. Man was made capable of dealing with universe. (I wish I could be as eloquent as my subject, but find myself babbling.) Man was created to have (to be capable of) dominion over the creation. That is why there is a fit between the mathematics man 'invents' and the physical universe.

5. ''The naturalist worldview can provide, in the words of Eugene Wigner, “no rational explanation” for the intelligibility of the universe (p. 60). But the Christian theist has an explanation: “the intelligibility of the universe is grounded in the nature of the ultimate rationality of God” (p. 61).

- The biblical view is that man can understand the universe because he was created to be able to understand it. i.e. he can't have dominion over it unless he understands it (or; the better he understands it the more capable he is of having godly dominion over it.) There is no explanation from Darwinists that adequately accounts for man's intellectual abilities. Evolutionists like to brag about how often E. correctly predicts things; but evolutionary theory does not predict human intelligence, (this is rarely admitted.) nor anything even approximating it.

Human genius is (from the E. point of view) entirely superfluous. It should not exist. If evolutionists were honest they'd admit that human beings should not exist. If E. (M2M) were correct human beings wouldn't exist, (and wouldn't be writing books claiming god is a delusion and that evolution created all things.) Only biblical creation can give an account for humankind's genius. People who reject the Genesis account are left with no explanation at all.

6. 'Lennox defends Paley’s basic design argument as philosophically sound. Hume had criticized design arguments, suggesting that the only way we could know the world was probably designed was by comparing it to other worlds, designed and not designed.

- I wonder what the atheist's homeboy would have to say if he were alive today. We can make the comparisons he only speculated about. If we compare earth to the other planets we know of we can only conclude it was designed. e.g. if we compare mars and earth which one looks more as if it were designed or 'terraformed' ? Which one looks as if there's been intelligent intervention at some point? (I'm not hot on this argument, but I think it's valid.)

7. 'The method of abduction, or inference to the best explanation, is appropriate, and is entirely untouched by Hume’s criticisms of design. “An argument that does explain a given effect is always better than one that does not” (p. 83). The question, then, is whether Darwinian evolution defeats the design argument by providing a better empirical explanation.

- The materialists have no plausible explanation for how a rock (planet earth) turned into a professor; how inert matter somehow transformed itself into living organisms, including man. All they have are speculations... none of which even convince materialists. The only answer I see is creation. The fact our professors don't like this answer doesn't mean it couldn't be true. There's no logical reason some kind of creation can't be true.

8. 'Lennox writes, the “sheer vehemence” of the defenders of Darwinism “fascinates me”. Why, he asks,
“ … is it only in connection with this area of intellectual endeavour that I have ever heard an eminent scientist (with a Nobel Prize to his name, no less) say in a public lecture in Oxford: ‘You must not question evolution.’” (p. 93).

- I find this intriguing myself. I don't understand it. I once accepted the materialist idea of an 'evolved' universe, but I never had any hatred of creation, creationists or problem with critiques of Darwinism.

'You must not question evolution'... being translated (into honest lingo) means 'you must not question materialism' or 'you must not say there's a god.' Why? Because he hates the very idea of God and creation. Why? Because he's a fallen creature in rebellion against his creator.

9. 'Lennox clearly explains the Shannon definition of information, and then explains the difference between Shannon information and semantic information (a crucial distinction that anti-design writers often fail to appreciate13). Lennox also explains the important concept of specified complexity. Information content that has both complexity (mathematically measurable) and specification (conforming to some meaning existing independently of itself) is inexplicable in terms of chance or natural law.

- Materialism can't explain how matter can stand for something other than itself; how it can be something other than itself; how the physical composition of X is the least important thing about it.

10. 'As he moves into a final chapter on the origin of information itself, Lennox notes that information itself is both invisible and immaterial (even though it is transmitted by physical means). “How could purely material causes account satisfactorily for the immaterial?” (p. 168). In short, the information in biology gives evidence of intelligent design.

- The problem materialists have is that they claim that only material things exist. i.e. they have no explanation for the immaterial, and thus no explanation for information. (Rather a big problem in the Age of Information :=}

11. 'In contrast, Genesis presents us with a Creator God who exists independently of the universe, but speaks into it. The gospel of John informs us that this Creator is the Word, the Word that “became human, to demonstrate fully that the ultimate truth behind the universe is personal” (p. 178).

- The key issue is this; is this a personal universe? or is it an impersonal universe? (If it's impersonal how did it create persons? Apologists for e. like to claim there are no questions can't answer; but I don't see any answers forthcoming for this vital question. An impersonal universe doesn't not predict persons.

Notes;
1. Grand undertaking; A review of God’s Undertaker: Has Science Buried God? by John C. Lennox - reviewed by Lael Weinberger
2. “Aunt Matilda’s cake” serves to explain the limits of the scientific enterprise (pp. 40–42). The finest natural scientists in the world could analyze the cake and tell us much about its chemical makeup, nutritional content, and protein structure, but they could not tell us the purpose for which Aunt Matilda made the cake. [above]
3. The likelihood that naturalism is correct is about the same as your waking up one night, looking out the window and seeing 100 moons in the sky.
- This is apparently what Steve Tibbetts did. Sample his music at YouTube; 100 Moons

You've got to hide your love away

2011-04-13T09:54:00.000-07:00

The Fermi paradox continues to befuddle people. Over the years many have suggested answers to this riddle. Today we look at one more attempt.

Quotes and comments;

1. Aliens who hide, survive;
'In order to explain the Fermi paradox, Kent [Adrian] turns to natural selection – and suggests that it may favour quiet aliens. [1.]

- If the grand theory of evolution (M2M) were true this 'real paradox' shouldn't exist. One wonders how evolution can be a fact while this paradox remains.

Is there any reason to believe these imagined aliens are any smarter or more prescient than humans. I mean we unintentionally revealed ourselves (with signals) long before Sagan did so intentionally. I would suspect any aliens would have done the same.
- can you use natural selection to 'analyze' imaginary creatures?

2. 'Has ET evolved to be discreet? An evolutionary tendency for inconspicuous aliens would solve a nagging paradox – and also suggest that we Earthlings should think twice before advertising our own existence. [1.]

- An evolutionary tendency? does that mean anything?

This doesn't explain why we don't see the aliens who don't hide. Don't all these cave cowering aliens have to be hiding from something?

Talking about an e. tendency in intelligent creatures doesn't make a lot of sense to me. We're told everyday that we're in the post evolutionary phase of our existence, that we need to take control of a random (natural) process and engineer our future e. in terms of rational goals. Wouldn't thinkers with the same views exist among the aliens?

If there really are billions of alien civilizations out there it seems quite a stretch to suggest they would all act the same way.

3. 'He argues that it's plausible that there is a competition for resources on a cosmic scale, driving an evolutionary process between alien species on different planets. Advanced species, for example, might want to exploit other planets for their own purposes.'

- I don't find that plausible at all. I don't see how advanced technology would require such a crude approach. surely in a universe as large as this there are an almost infinite number of unpopulated bodies to exploit if need be.

Summary;
I think this 'theory' is evidence of how badly the Fermi paradox bothers e. advocates. In my experience they take this far more seriously than any ID critique of evolution theory. They feel sure if E. theory is correct that there Has to be billions of aliens out there. If there isn't E. has been refuted. (Most, if not all Darwinists believe this... this is why they find countless ways to try and answer the paradox.

In the minds of most people; no aliens = creation. This is not so much a matter of irrefutable logic, but of feeling. i.e. until aliens are discovered (if they ever are) there will be doubt; doubt that evolution is true, doubt that creation isn't true.

With apologies to the Beatles, we'll end on a musical note.
"Here I stand head in hand
Turn my face to the wall
If they're gone I can't go on
Feelin' two-foot small." YouTube

Notes;
1. Exo-evolution: Aliens who hide, survive - Mark Buchanan - New Scientist
'As physicist Enrico Fermi argued in 1950, unless the evolution of life is unique to Earth, there must be many intelligent species out there. So why have they neither phoned home nor been detected by us?
"It's a real paradox," says Adrian Kent of the Perimeter Institute in Waterloo, Ontario, Canada.
2. You've got to hide your love away - Beatles
"Here I stand head in hand
Turn my face to the wall
If she's gone I can't go on
Feelin' two-foot small."
- in my scenario, the song gets sung by Seth Shostak.

Science, the ant and wisdom

2011-04-12T10:24:00.000-07:00

Now that more and more science types (e.g. Sam Harris) are offering science as a substitute for traditional wisdom it might do well to take a brief look at the subject.

Quotes and comments;

1. “What the world needs now? More wisdom,” is the headline of a press release from Concordia University reprinted by PhysOrg. While the headline is true, is science the one to tell anyone how to get it? Isn’t science concerned with natural laws and material processes?
Dolores Pushkar defined wisdom as “something that benefits society as a whole as well as the self.” [1.]

- This isn't very helpful. e.g. how do you know benefit means? what constitutes a true benefit as to an illusory one? How to weigh the benefits of society against the benefits to self. This defintion actually doesn't tell us a thing. e.g. how do you know what society is? how do you define it? how to you quantify it? is there such a thing as society?

Who says her definition is true? How would anyone know? If all is matter in motion, wisdom doesn't exist.

The Christian believes God's word is wisdom; true wisdom, and the basis of all other wisdom. ie. wisdom must conform (be consistent with) God's word.

"Go to the ant,'' the bible writer says, ''and it will teach you." You can indeed learn a lot from the ant; but you can't learn anything about how man should live, how he should treat others, how he should relate to his creator. (I'm not an expert on the ant, but I think that what you learn from the ant, is what it is to be an ant.) The 'wisdom' of the ant was pre-programmed into it at the creation. The 'wisdom' programmed into man was the ability to learn. Because the ant doesn't need to learn it has instincts, because man needs to learn he has an unquantifiable degree of freedom. [3.]

2. “No single definition of wisdom exists,” the press release admitted. [2]

- To be wise is to know the truth, to know the reality of a situation. Only God's wisdom can be universal; the wisdom of a human being is finite, partial and particular. The goal of the Christian isn't simply wisdom; it's far more important to be righteous. Scientific discoveries can help us to be wise, but they cannot help us to be righteous. (ie. know what is morally good.)

Science can help us to acquire wisdom in the sense it can help us to see more clearly; but it cannot tell us how we should live our lives. (Scientism is the claim there is no knowledge that can't be acquired by the scientific method; ie. the study of the material universe.) Science shouldn't be turned into a totalitarian project. There are things it does wonderfully well, and there are some things it cannot do at all. (The same is true of most things.)

Science is in the business of providing single defintions. If it can't give a single definition of X, it's likely X isn't a scientific subject. (ie. something that can be known by an investigation of the material world.) True laws of nature allow single definitions. Universals lend themselves to single deefinitions... while particulars do not. (People are different, they will never agree on what wisdom is.) The flux of human experience doesn't lend itself to single definitions. The more X changes over time the less able science is able to deal with it. In general science deals with things that aare unchangeable (or relatively so.)

3. Wisdom;
'The ability to discern or judge what is true, right, or lasting; insight.'
- The American Heritage definition is very different from the one this author gives. I'd like to know how you can tell us what wisdom is if you can't even define it. We don't learn where the definition she uses comes from. It sounds political; something pols would come up with; something self-serving.

4. "Wisdom and intelligence aren't the same thing," she points out, estimating that only 5 percent of the population can be described as truly wise and that advanced insight begins after adolescence as the brain matures.

- Want a bet these 5 percent are people who agree with her? This estimate is just plain silly. I imagine these would be people who know what is good for society and for the individual... as determined by ms. Pushkar. (You don't need a mature brain to be wise; certainly not to act wise. Anyone who knows children knows this.)

5. 'No single definition of wisdom exists, but hallmarks include knowledge, deep understanding of human nature, life contentment, empathy and the flexibility to see issues from others' perspectives.
- Well; that leaves Sam Harris out.

6. "Bitterness," Pushkar counters, "disqualifies a person from being considered as wise. It means they haven't learned any beneficial lessons from their experience."
- That leaves Richard Dawkins out. (Now, I don't know this for sure; but I get the feeling he thinks he's pretty wise.)

Mike Johnson

Notes;
1. Researchers Violate Separation of Science and State - Creation/Evolution Headlines 04/08/2011
'Wisdom science: To whom do you go for wisdom? A pastor, priest, or rabbi? A holy book? A trusted friend or academic? Never fear; science is here – science in the form of psychology.
2. What the world needs now? More wisdom PhysOrg
3. It's also true that man was made in the image of god; this means that when man has a heart for god he finds god's word and law to be true and admirable; when man rebels against God what was admirable becomes hateful to him. He still possesses the image of god within him, but now he finds it hateful. i.e. his conscience is a plague to him. If his rebellion continues long enough the still small voice of conscience within him at last becomes silent. (It's my guess that as long as the conscience is still alive men rage against god, but when the voice goes silent they stop raging against god and just 'quietly' go about their deeds. God (in this sense) has died, and there is no longer any reason to rage against him.
4. "Wisdom has an impact on how people cope in situations and whether they are more or less satisfied with life," explains Etezadi, a PhD student under Pushkar's direction.
- You need a PHD for this? And they claim we don't have enough scientists :=}
5. The science of wisdom! Sure.

A pitiless universe?

2011-04-11T10:58:00.000-07:00

I want to make a few comments on an article called A Third Way, written by James A. Shapiro.

Quotes and comments;

'There are far more unresolved questions than answers about evolutionary processes, and contemporary science continues to provide us with new conceptual possibilities. [1.]

- Don't anyone tell Eugenie Scott; this might ruin her whole day.

2. 'Although our knowledge of the molecular details of biological organization is undergoing a revolutionary expansion, open-minded discussions of the impact of these discoveries are all too rare. The possibility of a non-Darwinian, scientific theory of evolution is virtually never considered.'

- Never considered because the Darwinists are afraid to back down. They've stated that evolution (M2M) is a fact so many times that they feel they can't back down. They're afraid it would make them look bad, and make the creationists look good.

Is that any way to do science? Is refusing to admit problems good scientific method? (The situation is getting more and more like the Stalinists defending Lysenko.) We see that the Darwinists are trying hard to ban any criticism of their theory. Is that any way to do science? Is banning criticism of a theory scientific? How do you get from all reality merely being matter in motion to banning criticisms of a theory? (That would amount to matter in motion banning matter in motion :=}

It's hard to imagine people like Rich Dawkins admitting that Darwinism is wrong... or even that it has any problems. His ego wouldn't stand the implosion. He's a man who needs to be right, and needs other people to be wrong. This is what fuels his anger, and his anger fuels his writing. If he had to admit he was wrong, all that anger would disappear.

3. 'After a discussion of technical advances in our views about genome organization and the mechanisms of genetic change, I will focus on a growing convergence between biology and information science which offers the potential for scientific investigation of possible intelligent cellular action in evolution.

4. 'The past five decades of research in genetics and molecular biology have brought us revolutionary discoveries. Upsetting the oversimplified views of cellular organization and function held at mid-century, the molecular revolution has revealed an unanticipated realm of complexity and interaction more consistent with computer technology than with the mechanical viewpoint which dominated the field when the neo-Darwinian Modern Synthesis was formulated.
The conceptual changes in biology are comparable in magnitude to the transition from classical physics to relativistic and quantum physics.

- Neo-Darwinism (ND) was invented to deal with a radically more simple view of biology. In my opinion it can't begin to deal with the newly found complexity. It's an utterly outmoded theory. Darwinists try to soldier on by ignoring this complexity. If they say anything it's just to reiterate that somehow X evolved; we don't know how... but we will. ND will never be able to deal with information codes we see in living forms. Chance, mutation and selection will not do the job. Code isn't chemistry; chemicals react they don't create or send information.

6. 'Localized random mutation, selection operating "one gene at a time" (John Maynard Smith's formulation), and gradual modification of individual functions are unable to provide satisfactory explanations for the molecular data, no matter how much time for change is assumed. There are simply too many potential degrees of freedom for random variability and too many interconnections to account for.

- I think what he's saying (in simple form) is that things (functions) are too highly tuned to allow the blunt, heavy handed changes demanded by ND. ND would be like trying to fix a watch with a flame thrower.

7. 'First, then, all cells from bacteria to man possess a truly astonishing array of repair systems which serve to remove accidental and stochastic sources of mutation. Multiple levels of proofreading mechanisms recognize and remove errors that inevitably occur during DNA replication.

- ND practically equates errors (and damage with) evolution. A major problem is that cells have various ways of preventing changes caused by errors. They seem designed to fight against the possibility of evolution. Another problem for ND is to explain how errors (loss of information) can lead to the creation of new organs and functions. I see no way for this to happen. This is the hope that a huge amount of errors will lead to something positive. I see no basis for such hope.

8. 'It has been a surprise to learn how thoroughly cells protect themselves against precisely the kinds of accidental genetic change that, according to conventional theory, are the sources of evolutionary variability. By virtue of their proofreading and repair systems, living cells are not passive victims of the random forces of chemistry and physics. They devote large resources to suppressing random genetic variation and have the capacity to set the level of background localized mutability by adjusting the activity of their repair systems.

- It's refreshing to see an evolutionist admit some of these things; things creationists have been talking about for decades. (No wonder he's an unknown to the media elite; no such heretic can be allowed a public platform.)

9. 'The second major lesson of molecular studies into the origins of genetic change is that all cells possess multiple biochemical agents for natural genetic engineering--processes that include the cutting and splicing of DNA molecules into new sequence arrangements.
We have progressed from the Constant Genome, subject only to random, localized changes at a more or less constant mutation rate, to the Fluid Genome, subject to episodic, massive and non-random reorganizations capable of producing new functional architectures. Inevitably, such a profound advance in awareness of genetic capabilities will dramatically alter our understanding of the evolutionary process. Nonetheless, neo-Darwinist writers like Dawkins continue to ignore or trivialize the new knowledge and insist on gradualism as the only path for evolutionary change.'

10. '...cancer is now seen as a disease of the molecular information processing routines that ensure orderly cell growth and behavior in the healthy organism. Aberrant tumor cell growth appears to result from at least two kinds of malfunction: the loss of checkpoint controls, or the failure of decision-making routines that dictate programmed cell death (apoptosis) for cells in inappropriate surroundings.

- I don't know how any organism could survive without these systems in place. How then could they have evolved?
Earlier he referred to this system like this; 'One can characterize this surveillance/inducible repair/checkpoint system as a molecular computation network demonstrating biologically useful properties of self-awareness and decision-making.'

- To go from inert matter to this kind of sophistication requires more than ND can give us. Matter doesn't work this way; chemicals aren't interested in repair or health. ND is no longer even plausible. How long it will take for the Dawkins crowd to admit I don't know, but I'm certain evolutionary theory is going to change radically.

What Dawkins said about the universe being without pity etc. is what is true about matter.
"The universe we observe has precisely the properties we should expect if there is, at bottom, no design, no purpose, no evil, no good, nothing but blind, pitiless indifference."

Since the universe means everything there is, it's not the universe that has no pity it's matter. (i.e. No one would argue that every creature on earth is pitiless.) So how do you get from pitiless, uncaring, indifferent matter to self repair functions? Since matter is indifferent (as Dawkins admits) why did it create living organisms? And where did it get the blueprints, the designs, the information from? We all know that matter doesn't contain true information... that's perhaps why it's indifferent.... that's no doubt why it has no purpose.

11. 'Novel ways of looking at longstanding problems have historically been the chief motors of scientific progress. However, the potential for new science is hard to find in the Creationist-Darwinist debate.'

Both sides appear to have a common interest in presenting a static view of the scientific enterprise. This is to be expected from the Creationists, who naturally refuse to recognize science's remarkable record of making more and more seemingly miraculous aspects of our world comprehensible to our understanding and accessible to our technology.'

- I really don't know what he means by this. It's by no means true. I don't know of a creationist alive today doesn't admit to this. The fact we know so much more about living organisms (etc.) now than we did doesn't make them seem less miraculous, but more so. (One tires of hearing people make ignorant comments like this. Does the man even know a single creationist? or is he safely hiding in the anti-ID refuge of the campus. Maybe he should pop his head out and talk to a few folk.)

Summary;
I hate to contradict such an esteemed figure as Richard Dawkins, but life is th one thing we would not expect to see if all that existed was matter in motion.

Mike Johnson

Notes;
1. A Third Way - James A. Shapiro
Originally published in the February/ March 1997 issue of Boston Review
- to the best of my knowledge Shapiro is not a creationist.
2. 'In an important way, then, biology has returned to questions debated during the mechanism-vitalism controversy earlier this century.
- I don't know anything about this guy, but it sounds as if he might be some kind of a vitalist.
3. Life is the one thing we would not expect to see if all that existed was matter in motion.
4. Vitalism, as defined by the Merriam-Webster dictionary, is;
a. a doctrine that the functions of a living organism are due to a vital principle distinct from biochemical reaction.
b. a doctrine that the processes of life are not explicable by the laws of physics and chemistry alone and that life is in some part self-determining.
- what's missing in our view of the universe isn't some vitalistic life force, but information. (I suppose we could call information theory the new vitalism, but that might be confusing.)
5. 'But the neo-Darwinian advocates claim to be scientists, and we can legitimately expect of them a more open spirit of inquiry. Instead, they assume a defensive posture of outraged orthodoxy and assert an unassailable claim to truth, which only serves to validate the Creationists' criticism that Darwinism has become more of a faith than a science.'

Biomimetics and the earthquake argument

2011-04-07T10:34:00.000-07:00

In a real sense of the word, we're all creationists now. This is certainly true of anyone in the field of biomimetics. It's even true of the most vociferous atheist. If he's studying the creation he's a creationist. (i.e. if the world was indeed created, as I'm confident it was.)

Quotes and comments;

1. "Biomimetic engineers have already learned a lot from nature, and no doubt the further study of organisms and their often surprising capabilities will suggest, for example, new ways to design materials, to create imaging and communication techniques, and to build stronger or more aerodynamic structures. The inspiration comes from observing what is normal for the organisms and wondering how they function and how we might mimic key features or superior properties." [1.]

- I see the creation as a storehouse of knowledge that God has planted on the earth for our benefit. It's like a huge library just waiting for someone to come in and find something to read.

Let's be topical and talk earthquakes. Atheist thinkers have often used the earthquake argument to deny or vilify god; but what if all the knowledge we need to predict earthquakes is lying ready in nature? i.e. what if there are animals (organisms) that are able to predict earthquakes. We could study these creatures and learn methods for detecting earthquakes, and advance warning systems. This would mean all the deaths associated with the 'Lisbons' of history were unnecessary... that the knowledge we needed was readily available, but we just didn't make use of it.

It's possible certain animals avoid living in earthquake zones, or avoid certain areas at certain times. If we decide to live where we know earthquakes will one day happen, it's certainly no fault of God's.

- Mike 'the motorsike' Johnson [4.]

Notes;
1. Plagiarizing Nature Creation/Evolution Headlines 03/28/2011
'In Science March 18, Marc Lavine reviewed a recent book on biomimetics edited by Robert Allen with the amusing title Bulletproof Feathers: How Science Uses Nature’s Secrets to Design Cutting-Edge Technology (University of Chicago Press, 2010).
2. LiveScience;
“The thinking behind scientists’ interest in super-small DNA bots is that in order to replicate some amazing abilities in nature, one must go very small.” Even more shocking, they are using intelligent design: “‘Information is programmed into the design of the base sequences of the DNA strands,’ [Andrew] Turberfield said.”
- Very interesting. A belief in materialism leads scientists to ignore information when they speak of the make up of an organ etc. They restrict themselves to its physical components, but ignore the encoded information. If there is an 'essence' to an organism, it's the information that in-forms the physical matter. Information is the key component of all organisms. There is only one source for information that we know of, and that's intelligence.
3. Biomimetics;
'The study of the structure and function of living things as models for the creation of materials or products by reverse engineering.'
- Hm. Can you reverse engineer something that wasn't first engineered :=}
4. I'm adding a nick name just for today, in honor of my elderly mother who is not feeling well. She used to call me this name when she was in a good mood. Get well soon Mother. (I hope I spelled motorsike correctly.)
- when I was a boy I almost lived on a bicycle.

Self repair as evidence of design

2011-04-06T11:05:00.000-07:00

Self-repair is only a capacity of living organisms. Rocks that fall and break apart don't have a mechanism that puts them back together again. I don't see that self-repair would be predicted from physics. I see it as the product of intelligence.

Quotes and comments;

1. 'Some 10 times a day in a given cell, your DNA breaks on both strands. This is an emergency. Unless repaired quickly, serious diseases, like cancer, can develop. But no fear: the first responder is an octopus-shaped protein complex that rushes to the rescue, wraps around the damaged site, and brings in all the parts needed to fix it. [1.]

- This strikes me as a system designed to prevent evolution. Such a system would seem to be predicted by the creation model. e.g. it would seem likely care was taken to make sure man didn't die out, and that he didn't change (evolve) into something else entirely. Measures would have to be taken to ensure the ongoing viability of the the organism. (I'm referring to macro evolution)

2. 'How a set of proteins can sense damage, migrate to a repair site, assess the extent of the break and select the correct repair option, link up to other tools, bring in parts, and put everything back together again is surely one of the wonders of biology coming to light with new observing techniques. [1.]

- I don't know how such systems could evolve; they seem to be the opposite of evolution. The more we know about the biological self the more amazing it is any of are alive, that we can survive 70 years or more. Great care had to have been taken to provide self-repair mechanisms to allow our continued existence.

''The abstract did not mention evolution except to say that the parts are “conserved” (unevolved) across all living things.' [1.]

- Maybe I'm missing something, but I see 'conserved mechanisms' as evidence against evolution. If all is evolution, if nothing in biology makes sense apart from evolution, why are so many factors conserved? i.e. why don't they evolve? To me this means designs are in place to work against evolution.

- The language here is interesting.
Conserve;
'late 14c., from O.Fr. conserver (9c.), from L. conservare "to keep, preserve, keep intact, guard," from com-, intensive prefix (see com-), + servare "keep watch, maintain"

- It seems to me that designs are in place to preserve, keep intact and guard important entities. We know that there are mechanisms within the cell that do indeed keep watch (to spot if things go wrong). This speaks clearly of design to me.

We know that viable machinery sent into space, and thus cut off from sources of human repair, must be able to repair themselves. Systems need to be in place that constantly monitor the functioning of the machine, and there must be mechanisms in place that can repair damage when it's spotted. We know from our own experience in designing (and imagining) space craft what to expect from any entity that has been designed for independent existence.

As space craft design gets more sophisticated we see that engineers are designing into these craft many of the features we see within the cell. In a way we could say that the cell is the ideal model for a space craft. If we could build a space craft that had all the same systems as the cell it could possibly explore the universe for millions or even billions of years.

Notes;
1. Your DNA Repairman Is Handy as an Octopus Creation/Evolution Headlines 03/27/2011

Are we alone? Why do we care?

2011-04-05T15:15:00.000-07:00

Today I want to make a few comments on a recent lecture given by Paul Davies. His lecture (The Eerie Silence) addresses the possibility of extraterrestrial intelligence.

Quotes and comments;

1. He opens by saying the the biggest question out there is, are we alone in the universe? [1.]

- Isn't the biggest question does god exist? certainly people in the past thought so... but I suppose if you're certain God does not exist, then I suppose this does become the biggest question. It's not the biggest question for me; as I'm at least bright enough to realize I can't know that there isn't a God.

It intrigues me that it's perfectly acceptable to search for ETI (something we have no evidence of whatsoever) but it's not acceptable (among royal socity types) to search for god... of whom many claim there is abundant evidence. We see bias at work here. Davies claims that what the Seti Institute (not Yeti institute) does is real science. Maybe it is, maybe it isn't... but as of yet there is no evidence. He claims (humorously) that Seti is a sexy subject... well, maybe... but I think the search (quest) for God is more profound.

2. I find it interesting that Paul Allen (the rampant anti creationist) is funding a major SETI project (radio telescopes in California). It has struck me over the years that the more opposed to creation a person is, the more attracted they are to the search for ETI. (This can't be a purely scientific thing then can it? i.e. it may be science, or use some of the methods employed by pedestrian scientists, but the impulse is spiritual or philosophical if you prefer; i.e. metaphysical.)

The hope of the Allen project is that it will greatly increase the 'size' of the search; ie. the area looked at (listened to). This ignores the assumption of some, that if ETIs existed they would have spread throughout the universe by now. If that were the case it wouldn't help to increase the search area.

3. Davies says 'we have absolutely no evidence intelligent life exists beyond earth.'

4. He admits this is a speculative project... (so this would seem to admit that a subject can be both speculative and scientific)

5. Davies claims the problem is that this is a needle in a haystack search... but is it? How do we know? Again; this denies the idea I mentioned earlier. (Some people have argued that if there were ETI the universe would have at least machines scattered everywhere... exploring and so forth.)

6. He gives one possible explanation for the silence as being that no one out there know we exist; that since our radio signals have only being going out for a hundred years... anyone more than a hundred light years away wouldn't know we were here. (This too ignores the colonization project as it were... the fact ETIs would have spread out everywhere in the galaxy.)

7. At the 20 min. mark he admits aliens might have sent out probes...

8. He talks about Drake's famous equation (which I consider one of the greatest examples of wishful thinking out there... as it's utterly arbitrary, and not an equation at all.)

9. He claims there might be a trillion earth like planets in our galaxy alone (if I heard him right). I can only say then, that if the grand theory of evolution were true, we would most certainly not be alone... and that the galaxy would be filled with evidence of alien existence. (It's a relatively simple thing to send machines out into space after all... and theory states that many of these planets have existed for many billions of years before earth appeared.)

10. 'We don't know how life began' he says. (In my view we don't know how it could have began.)

11. "Man at last knows that he is alone in the unfeeling immensity of the universe, out of which he emerged only by chance. " - Jaques Monod

- Davies calls this, a rather sexist remark. Good grief... pc speech has turned our academics into clowns.) Well; contra Monod, we don't know this at all... though I suspect he's right for the reason I mentioned earlier.

By chance? I agree with people who say that if life did 'emerge' by undirected means it could not have been by chance. (The odds are just far too great.)

12. "Life is almost bound to arise... wherever conditions are similar to earth." - Christian deDuve

- This is the more popular view in our day. Notice that he just assumes there are planets similar to earth.) This is the idea 'life' happens by some kind of law; presumably a law of chemistry or physics. (If this were true you would think it would be easy to create life with OOL experiments... and we know this doesn't happen. This being the case I don't see how it can be a law at all.) I don't think 'life' can happen by chance, and I think OOL experiments have shown it doesn't happen by law either.

13. "Life is a cosmic imperative'' deDuve says.

14. Davies says life might have started on mars and come to earth. Why would anyone say that? A totally dead, barren planet gave birth to life on earth? This makes absolutely no sense to me, and show how desperate this alien hunters (whisperers) are. I consider this 'idea' to be only comical; fit only for a satirical sf novel.

15. It's interesting to me that scientists can talk about Mother Nature, but it's taboo to speak of god. (Gee; isn't mother nature a god? or a goddess? she/it certainly isn't an entity in the real world.)

16. Intelligence taks billions of years to evolve he says.

- He doesn't know that. That's theory and speculation. He doesn't bother to tell us how this could happen. No one knows how it could happen, but he feels free to just assume it. (ie. we know there is no god and therefore no creation; therefore e. must be true.) The idea that 'time' (the great wand waving fairy godmother of materialism) can do all things is a logical, philosophical fallacy. This idea really means that given enough time anything is possible; ie. time doesn't do anything, it just allows chance events to happen. The trouble with this idea is that 'life' violates all we know of chemistry and physics.

17. He claims earth is the most earth like planet. This is sophistry. Earth isn't earth like... it's earth itself. When we say x is like y we don't mean it is exactly the same. That makes no sense.

18. He talks of 'unknownons'...

- I take these are particles (or?) we haven't discovered yet. (It never seems to strike people that we may not yet be clever enough to discover god... that this is something that might await us in the future... when we've taken some advance in thinking or in technology... or made some new discovery. Atheists seem to take it for granted that they're clever enough to know if god exists.)

19. He tells us he's sure biological intelligence will be superseded by machine intelligence. (That makes no sense to me.) He talks about something called Quintelligence; some form of quantum intelligence... the size of a suitcase... out there between the galaxies. We see how desperate people are to answer the Fermi paradox. Apparently the greatest horror these people can imagine is that we are indeed unique. They will go to any length to escape this conclusion. One might wonder why. You see by this example how one need never abandon a cherished hypothesis if one doesn't want to.

20. Why should we do seti he muses. Well; he tells us it forces ust to ask the questions we should ask; eg. what is life? what is intelligence? what is the destiny of the human race?

- Should? Does he forget we're just matter in motion? This is a very weak response to his own question. If people want to play this game that's fine; but in no way should people be forced to pay taxes for such a thing. We can ask all these questions without seti.

21. He says that a quintelligence might be uninterested in anything beyond itself and so not seek us out. This can't be known of course... but it flies in the face of our interest in SETI... and presumes that these intelligences are all the same. I find that hard to believe.

Notes;
1. The eerie silence - Paul Davies; video lecture; Royal Society

Understanding Intelligent design; a guide for the confused

2011-04-04T10:07:00.000-07:00

While ID proponents are trying hard to make their model understandable, and to clear up misconceptions people have about it, many evolutionists are trying hard to confuse the issue. They like to present false notions of ID, and to spread disinformation about it. While this is one method of winning a debate, they shouldn't expect any accolades for their tactics. While they insist creationists give a scrupulously accurate account of the evolutionary model, they show no willingness to return the favor. They might be wearing lab coats, but they argue like tobacco company lawyers.

Quotes and comments;

1. The quotes are taken from the video lecture 'Understanding Intelligent design' given in 2010 by Paul Nelson. [1.] If people really want to know what ID is, they would do better to watch this video than listen to the insults and obfuscations offered by materialists.

2. 'One of the main criticisms of ID is that it's merely god of the gaps reasoning. i.e. science can't solve x and so ID people claim this as evidence for God or for design.'

3. 'Roger Penrose, while not a theist, at least in the conventional sense, is a Platonist... in that he believes mathematical entities are real and exist in a non-material realm.'

4. Nelson uses a definition of ID that says; 'The theory of ID holds that certain features of the universe... are best explained by an intelligent cause...'

- No one, not even Dawkins, can deny that some things in the universe are the product of intelligent design. (e.g. my beer mug.) It's not a matter of design vs no design; but of what things are, or were, designed.
The key issue as I see it is this; how can we decide whether X is or was designed. I don't think ID advocates have solved this. They've demonstrated that undirected processes don't work, but they haven't given us a method we can use. (As far as I know.)

I think the closest they come is to say; 'there's no way undirected physical processes could account for X' but this is a negative approach if you will. I personally think it works quite well, but it doesn't satisfy materialists or evolutionists. They seem to feel physical processes can do anything. (With the possible exception of producing a hit song on the radio. If there are there any hit songs anymore.)
They haven't demonstrated this; but this is their claim. (I don't know why they think undirected physical processes can produce an eye but not a rap song :=}

The question is this; how can we recognize intelligence in the universe? Well; I find it easy to recognize in fellow humans (at least some of them). If I see in the world what I see in my mind (that sounds awkward) then I think I have a right to call it intelligence. Examples would be what? planning? purpose? creativity? the ability to produce something beyond inert matter? something not found in inert matter? Codes? language? the arbitrary? that which violates physical law? (e.g. the airplane)
I personally think that 'life' is evidence of intelligence, but I realize Darwinists don't.

To me birds are evidence of intelligence; i.e. the ability to fly. I think this is as much evidence for intelligence as the airplane. In a merely physical universe things fall; they do not fly. (They might explode upwards, but that's not flying; by flying I mean winged flight.) This is a violation of the law of gravity if you will. It's not 'natural' at all. A falling rock is natural, not a bird riding an updraft. (By natural I mean physical.)

Atheists claim that 'supernatural' explanations have no place in science. The trouble with this statement is that it appear to rule out human beings (supra natural) as causes, as explanations for certain events. e.g. what's the explanation for an artificial cochlear implant? It's certainly not natural; it's not the product of natural selection. It obviously has a supra natural explanation. The cause isn't physics but intelligence. [3.]

5. "The statements of science must invoke only natural things processes." - National academy of sciences

- Must? Is that a scientific concept? This definition isn't scientific, but philosophical. If only science can give us truth, this definition can't be true.

Let's look at a definition of must;
a. 'To be obliged or required by morality, law, or custom: Citizens must register in order to vote.
b. 'To be obliged; be necessarily compelled; be bound or required by physical or moral necessity, or by express command or prohibition. - Century Dictionary

- Hmm... the definition of science given above, doesn't sound very scientific to me. To say science 'must' do x or y is to posit morality law or custom as the foundation of science. Their definition has the musty smell of an old law book.

Does this definition mean there can't be any science of things and processes created by human beings? e.g. can there be no computer science? no science of medicine? no science of engineering?
Let's go way out there; let's say sometime in the future men create a planet, and fill it with biological life forms they've created in the laboratory... including intelligent bipeds. The question then is this; can there be no science on this planet?

Is man a 'natural' thing or process? Not in any ordinary sense of the term. Natural refers to physics, when used in discussions concerning science. (From McMillan; natural; existing in nature and not produced or caused by people.)

From The Skeptic's dictionary - Natural;
'Civilization is unnatural. Indoor plumbing is unnatural. Corrective lenses are unnatural. So are automobiles.
' To have a broken arm set by a physician is unnatural. To let it heal spontaneously would be natural, even if debilitating for life. Getting a medical degree is unnatural. Foraging and experimenting by trial and error would be natural, even if often lethal. Children born with no brains or other monstrous deformities are natural. Brain surgery to remove a tumor is unnatural. ' - Robert T. Carroll

- A key word in this definition is only. i.e. it has to be what we say and cannot be anything else. (The totalitarian mindset in full flower.)

Only;
'In but one manner, for but one purpose, by but one means, with but one result, etc.; [Century]

- This academy definition of science is meant to ensure a single result... i.e. it's meant to ensure the process produces a single answer, the answer the authors desire and approve of. Method is intimately tied with result. There is a purpose behind this definition. What they call 'science' has the purpose of producing results (conclusions, etc.) that they approve of, and want to propagate. There is only one way to do things; and it's our way.
This reminds me of a game; the rules for a game; e.g. the rules for billiards... but science isn't a game, it's a universal human drive... the drive of curiosity, the drive to know things, the drive to discover. There can't be rigid rules for something as grand, as wide, as deep as that.

6. Nelson tells us that we need more than natural causes and supernatural causes; we need to add a third category; that of intelligence.

7. Nelson would prefer to divide causes not into natural vs supernatural; but natural vs intelligent.

8. He repeats the famous quotation by Arthur c. Clarke ''Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic."

- Hmm.... I wonder if that applies to the 'technology' involved in the creation of man by god? i.e. is the reason the majority of scientists say they don't see evidence for design, simply the fact the 'technology' is too advanced?

9. He quotes Wallace Arthur as saying the creation of body plans isn't explained by textbook evolution.

10. He quotes Arthur as saying, "what we (evolutionists) need is some creation science (i.e. of the good kind.) ie. some way to account for the creation of body plans.

- The trouble for the materialist is that there is no way this can happen in terms of undirected physics. ie. there can't be any 'creation science' within the materialist model. They will forever be seeking for it, as life transcends the realm of physics, or the merely material.

11. He presents a case for ID using the life cycle of the Monarch butterfly; claiming it required intelligence. (Seems persuasive to me.)

12. Nelson concludes by saying that many of the unsolved problems of E. theory might be the result of asking the wrong questions. i.e. because you ask a question doesn't mean there's an answ3er you're going to like. (e.g. how did life spontaneously emerge on earth)

Notes;
1. Paul Nelson - Understanding Intelligent design [video; available free online]
Northwest Creation Network
- you can access his lecture on the 'tree of life' at the same site; excellent as well.
2. I can't promise I got each quote exactly correct; though I'm confident I'm close.
3. Supranatural; same as supernatural
'Of or relating to existence outside the natural world.
Supra;
A prefix of Latin origin, meaning ‘above,’ ‘beyond.’
4. One of the claims you see repeated endlessly is that creationists just don't understand evolutionary theory. Well; I hate to bring some light into the conversation, but Paul Nelson understands both biology and E. theory. (It would be nice if the Darwinists would finally drop this fallacious argument.)
5.. I wrote this post while listening to 'Beyond the Missouri sky' by Charlie Haden and Pat Metheny; so if there are any errors in it, you can blame them. It got hard to concentrate at points. (Love the cut Spiritual)

The fallacy of Naturalism

2011-04-02T16:16:00.000-07:00

I've just finished watching a couple videos (on the general topic of creation) by John Byl. He's one of my favorite creationist writers and speakers. I want to comment briefly on the videos, and encourage you to watch them.

Quotes and comments;

1. The videos in question are available online (for free or for sale) at Northwest Creation Network. The first is Cosmology; explaining the universe; and the second is War of the worldviews; Christianity vs Naturalism [1.]

2. War of the worldviews
- I'll provide some quotes by Byl (and others) and make a few comments.

- It's interesting that that great favorite of atheists Nietzsche said that science has killed god... but he also said science has killed truth.

- Abraham Kuyper said it's not a matter of faith vs science, but of two (opposing) scientific systems... each having its own faith.

- 'The origins debate is not about facts, but about their proper interpretation.'

- 'It's not science vs Christianity, but naturalistic explanations vs christian explanations.'

- 'A worldview (to be respectable) ought to be livable.' (This is something materialism is not.

- "Free will simply doesn't not exist, evolution cannot produce a being that is truly able to make choices." - William Provine
I'm tempted to agree with that. I don't think 'evolution' could produce such a being. I see this as evidence for creation.

Notice that Provine says free will simply does not exist. Simply? Well, let's leave that aside. You see where a consistent materialism gets you; it paints you into a corner called absurdity. Does anyone think prof. Provine doesn't think he has any free choice? Did he have no choice but to make that statement? We might wonder why other humans, being mere matter in motion, make the opposite statement.

If human beings have no free will, why are atheists continually attacking people for holding to superstitous beliefs? ie. if they have no free will what good will it do to harangue them, and to challenge them to change? This makes no sense to me. (This means that fellows like Provine and Dawkins shouldn't pride themselves on being progressive, fearless, etc. as they had no choice in what they've done.)

If we have no free will how do we know any statement is true? ie. we're no free to agree or disagree with X, and our conclusions about it are beyond our control. They aren't true or false; they just are.

"The universe cares nothing for us,'' says Provine.

- I agree. Inert matter can't care about anything or anyone. According to the Bible, it's God who cares. (If the universe were mere matter in motion there could not be caring of any kind... and one wonders why Provine has such a word in his vocabulary, and why he employs it. I suppose devising a grammar consistent with materialism would be impossible)

The materialist claims that only natural causes exist. One wonders how he knows a cause is natural or not. (Maybe causes only appear to be natural.) There is no way I know of to prove causes are natural. (ie. not created) There is no way to prove the universe (and all in it) weren't created.

According to Roger Penrose (Shadows of the Mind) there are three worlds (and three mysteries). There's the word of matter; the world of ideas; the world of absolute truth (which he apparently equates with mathematics?). The mystery or mysteries, is how we get from one world to the other.

''Given our best scientific theories, factors beyond our control produce all our actions, we are not therefore morally responsible for them." - Derk Pereboom (Living without free will)

- How can he possibly know this? If there is no free will, there is no freedom when it comes to reasoning... therefore we can't possibly know if a statement is true or false. One wonders why the word moral is in his vocabulary. (If no one is responsible why do some people get tenure?) Given his own wview, his claim is meaningless.

If there is no free will, how does he know which theories are the best? He has no choice in his decision... therefore he's not making a choice between alternatives.

"We are machines made by DNA, whose purpose is to make more copies of the same DNA. That is exactly what we are for. It is every living object's sole reason for living." - Dawkins/1994

- This must surely be one of the stupidest statements ever made. How this sad raver can be so popular is beyond me. I can only explain it by thinking people so love the Christian bashing he does that they forgive or forget radical statements such as this. He has no right to speak of humans as machines; as machines are made by intelligent agents. Purpose? There can be no purpose in the hell of a u. he postulates.
Exactly? What a farce. Apparently this fool thinks his wild speculations have the same validity as mathematics. This is what we are for he says. This is gibberish; there is no teleology in his crackpot universe.... nor can there be. Reason for living? There could be no reason for living in the pulp fiction universe he writes about.

'According to the Westminster Confession; the purpose of man is to glorify God and to enjoy him forever.'

Notes;
1. Northwest Creation Network - videos
2. It's interesting to me that people like Peter Atkins like to attack theism... but say virtually nothing about the post modernists. They like to pretend their fellow tenured elite don't even exist... as if they haven't made any arguments against this positivist idea that 'science' provides us with absolute truth.